:J
1
j
,
,
"
those in Mecca, MedIna and Jerusalem.' This !)adith shows its sharp
tendentiousness in an addition which, apparently, belonged to its
original form but was later neglected by levelling orthodoxy in this
and related sayings: 'and a prayer in the Bayt al-Maqdis of Jerus-
alem is better than a thousand prayers in other holy places:' i.e.
even Mecca or Medina. Later,' too, 'Abd ai-Malik is quoted when
the pilgrimage to Jerusalem is to be equated with that to Mecca,>
and Syrians never tired of creating !)adiths expoundingthe excellence
of visits to the Syrian sanctuaries and their equality with the holy
places of the I;Iijaz. Muslims are recommended, for example. under a
promise of paradise, to combine the bajj with a pilgrimage to al-
KhaJ.n, etc.
4
It seems likely that the fable that the Zamzam welI pays a yearly
visit' to the spring of Siloah during the night of 'Aratat belongs to
this group of tendentious beliefs and aimed at giving Jerusalem an
equivalent to the miraculous Zamzam.
A large number of !)adiths have the purpose of demonstrating the
special dignity of the Jerusalem sanctuary, which was brought to
the fore during the Umayyad period. Maymuna, a woman of the
Prophet's entourage, is said to have asked the folIowing question of
!
him: 'Give us a decision about the Jerusalem sanctuary (bayt
al-maqdis)'; whereupon the Prophet replied:. 'Make Pilgrimag:.s to
it and pray there'-war was then rampant m these lands'- and,
if you are unable to get there and pray, send oil in order to light the [37]
lamps.'7 In general, all tradItions dealing with the question of
1 AI-Ya'qubi. II, p. 31 I, d. Clermont·Ganneau in]A, 1887. I, p. 482. It
is not surprising that orthodox writers do not mention al·ZuhrI's role in the
establishment of the Qubbat as a place of pilgrimage; al-Damiri
(s.v. at.skat). II, p. 51. [There is no doubt that in this extreme form, according
to which 'Abd al·Malik intended to substitute the pilgrimage to Jerusalem
for the lJ,ajj, the tradition is an anti-Umayyad invention; yet it is not im·
possible that the Umayyads had a share in the propagation of
supporting the holiness of Jerusalem. For these problems cf. S. D. GOltem, In
JAOS. 1950, pp. 104 fl.; O. Grabar, in At's Orientatis. III, PP' 35-6, 45-6.]
I Ibn al·Faqih al-Harnadani, p. 95. 3; Ibn Miija, p. 102.
I AI.Ya'qllbi. ibid., p. 358. ult.
.. Mantki'i'l'iU al.Nawawl, fol. 22a. Of the 1}.adiths criticized here it is expressly
noted that they are current amongst the common people of Syria ('awamm
aM aI-Sham).
yaq'Ot. nI, p. 726. 7. Perhaps this tendency also influenced the develop.
ment of the legends of the ;;akhra; the $akhra was said to compete with the
'black stone' of Mecca. It is possible also that'Abd al·Malik had this in mind
when he extended the mosque to include the $akhra in its territory.
{I. From this parenthesis the tendency of the 1).adith is evident. In other
versions there is the addition also here: because a prayer in this is worth a
thousand prayers (anywhere else): Ibn al·Faqih, p. 96, IO. cf. above.
1 Abu Dawfid, I. p. 48; the tradition in respect of the three mosques, ibid,
p. 202: 'an al-Zuhri 'an Sa'rd b. al-Musayyib 'an AM 'an al-naM; d.
B.]umu'ano. 26; al.Tinnidhi, I, p. 67.
•
[381
VOLUME TWO: CHAPTER 2
whether Syria of Medina had preference! and answering it in favour
of Syria are probably due to Umayyad influence. In effect, the
decision of this question is connected with the other one; Banii.
Umayya or Banil Hashim?' The Umayyads called the Prophet's city
al-khabUha, the dirty one,' and a governor of Yazid I gave it the
name of al-natna,4 the evil-smelling one, in contrast to the epithet
tayba, the sweet-smelling one, which pious Muslims gave
5
to the
venerable city and which they claimed had been used for the
Prophet's city already in the Tawrat.
6
On the other hand it was possible at the same time to hear widely
spread popular songs in the streets of Medina which glorified this
town at the expense of its rival, Damascus, so that the caliph al-
Walid II declared that he would have to abstain from the since
in the l;'!ijaz he had always to listen to such songs.
7
The following
account gives us some insight into the conflict of these two trends:
Abu'l-Darda' (who acted as a judge in Syria) asked Salman al-
Farisi to come to the 'holy land'-meaning Syria-(hal'''mna
ita'l-an}. al-m'Uqaddisa) whereupon Salman is said to have answered:
'Nobody can sanctify the land, but good deeds sanctify man."
How the Umayyads made it their business to put into circulation
!)adiths which seemed to them desirable, and how people of the
type of the pious al-Zuhri acquiesced in being their tools-though
they certainly were not guided by selfish motives' but merely by
reasons of state expediency-is to be seen from evidence preserved
by aI-Khatib aI-BaghdadI which deserves to be considered in this
context. Here we find an account which is handed down by various
1 l)adiths invented in favour of Syria arc likely to be found preserved and
collccted in large numbers in a chapter concerning this in the monograph on
Damascus by Ibn 'Asakir; unfortunately I have no access to this work. See
the titlcs of the relevant chapters in Kremer, abel' meine Sammlung ol'ientalis.
eher Handschl'ijten, [Vienna, 1885] p. 16. [This is now available in VoL I of the
Damascus ed., by al.Munajjid, 1323, and in the new Damascus ed., 1951 fl.)
2 See esp. Agh., XV, p. 30, I I, and cf. Yaqui, ITI, p. 243, 9.
3 AI.'lqd, II, p. 14°,8 from the bottom.
" Al-Ma'sudi, V. p. 16r, 3.
The saying in B. no. 61 (to Sura 4:7r) sound like polemics against
the nickname al·khabftha: {ayyibafun tanJf.'I.khabatha kama tanfi'l·nayu
(var. kim) khabathllt al-fiddati 'this city is sweet·smelling, it removes dirt as fire
removes dirt from silver (var. badId iron); d. At.Muwa{!a', IV, p. 6I. Origi.
nally al.balad al-{ayyib seems to have been opposed to b. khabith in the sense
that it was fertile and the other sterile soil: Sftra 7:56.
6 ZDMG, XXXII, p. 386; cf. :Ej[assan, in Ibn Hisham, p. r022, 5.
7 Agh., I, p. 21, 6 ff.; cf. p. 22, 25 fl.
a At-Muwat{a', III, p. 245.
II The selflessness of al·Zuhri is especially praised: his contemporary 'Amr b
Dinar says of him: rna ra'aytu al·dariihim wa'l-danan!.r ahwan 'alayhi
minhu, kiinat al.do-yaMm wa't·dananlr 'indahu bi·manzilat al.ba'ar, in aI-
Tirmidhi, p. 104, bottom.
:j

..
UMMAYADS AND \ ABBAS IDS 47
'ways' from 'AbO. al-Razzaq (d. ZII), a disciple of Ma'mar b. Rashid
(d. 153), in the name of the latter; Ma'mar himself belonged to the
group of the disciples of al-Zullri. This account tells us that the
Umayyad Ibrahim b. al-Walid-it is not stated whether he was the
subsequent ruler
'
of this name (d. Iz6)-came to al-Zuhri with a
note-book he had written, and asked his permission to spread the
sayings contained in it as !)adiths communicated by al-Zuhri. The
latter gave his permission easily: 'Who else could have told you the
!)adiths?'2 Thus the Umayyad was enabled to circulate the contents
of his manuscript as texts taught him by al-Zuhri. This account fully
confirms the willingness of al-Zullri (for which we have quoted an
example above) to promote the interests of the dynasty by religious
means. His piety probably caused his conscience to be troubled
occasionally but he could not for ever resist the pressure of the
governing circles. The Ma'mar just mentioned preserved a charac-
teristic saying by al-Zuhli: 'these emirs forced people to write
!)adiths' (akrahana 'alayhi ha'ula'i'l-umara').2 This account can
only be understood on the assumption of al-Zuhri's willingness to
lend his namc
1
which was in general esteemed by the Muslim com-
munity, to the govemment1s wishes.
In the next chapter we shall have to consider more closely the
relation of the intransigent pious groups with the Umayyad govern-
ment. AI-Zuhri did not belong to the circle of the irreconcilable but
to those who thought a modus vivendi with the government was
desirable. He did not avoid the court but moved unhesitatingly in
the ruler's entourage, r1 and we even see him, during a pilgrimage of
al-l;'!ajjaj, among the followers of this bogey of the pious.' He was
employed by Hisham as tutor to the prince' and under Yazid II
he even consented to accept the office of judge. 7 In such circumstances
he must have had the gift of overlooking certain measures not con-
forming to religion and could hardly belong to the circles who with
1 The text of the story goes against this: ra'aytu rajulan min Ban! Umayya
('a. man of the B. Umayya') is a phrase hardly likely to have been used of the
prince. On the other hand, this IbrahIm is mentioned among those people who
took over };ladiths from al.Zuhrl, Ibn 'Asakir in al.Suyuti, Ta'rf.kh, p. 99, II.
[See Ibn 'Asakir, ed. 1323, II, 303; the following story is also found there.]
Z AI.Khatib aI·Baghdadi, fo1. 73b [ed. Hyderabad, p. 266].
3 lASB, 18.')6, p. 322, no. 71 [=al·Khatib, Taqyld, p. r07: for other passages
cf. the editor's notes.] Sprenger does not explain these \vords correctly:
'we induced also those chiefs (who are not mentioned) to disapprove of it'.
From the above it is evident who 'those emirs' are. Sprenger's explanation is
based upon the wrong reading akrahna instead of akrahana; cf. Muir, Mahomet,
I, p.xxxiii.
• At·'lqd. II, p. 3'0.
'JASE, 1856, p. 326. no, 93. TaqY!d, p. 140J.
\I In Sprenger's article: 'Alfred von Kremer's edition of Wakidy,' lASE,
1856, p. 2'!0. [Cf. the references in BSOAS, 1957, p. xx].
7 Ibn Qutayba, ed. Wustenfeld, p. 239, 9.
[391
VOLUME TWO: CHAPTER 2 UMMAYADS AND lABBASIDS
49
passive resistance opposed the khulafa' al-jawr oral-:;alamaL-as the
pious called the rulers of the dynasty under whose governors 'the
world was filled with injustice.'2 These groups, which contained
men who even took it amiss if poor readers of the Koran practised
their pious trade at the court of some mighty man of the period,'
regarded any association with the powers that be and the prevailing
trend as prohibited. 'He who follows the government will be led
into temptation' (man itlaba'a at-sultan iftatana).4 It was considered
impermissible-and one bluntly refused-to enter government
service and any office depending on it, especially that of Qac;1i.'
Since the government was well aware that such refusal was based
on an aversion on principle to the rules, a refusal of office was often
cruelly punished or the acceptance of the office enforced.' In order
[401 to escape such compulsion 'Amir al-Sha'bi (d. ca. IDs-ro) dressed in
coloured robes, engaged in trivial games and mixed with the youths
in the streets with the intention of appearing to be unworthy of the
office of Qac;1i. 7 This Sha'bi was an enemy of the government since he
actively participated in the rising of al-Ash'ath against al-!:Iajjaj.'
To accept the office of judge under the wicked government was
considered illicit by such people' and the pious did not relinquish
this principle even under the 'Abbiisids. 'He who accepts office as
judge is like someone who is being slaughtered without a knife'
(fa-qail ilhubiba bi-ghayr sikkin).19 These people were more consistent
and morally serious than those poets who-like al-Tirimmal). (d.
roo)-sided with the Kharijitcs" or other opposition parties and
nevertheless did not refuse to present panegyrical qa§iilas to the
Umayyad governors for the sake of money." AI-Zuhri did not have to
consider scruples about accepting public office under the Umayyads
13
1 Cf. lA., 1850, I, p. 178.
2 Abfi'l-Ma1).asin, I, p. 243, 9.
:5 Cf. the story about J:Iasan al-Ba!?ri in al· JawaIi:qI, ed. Derenbourg, Morgen.
landische Forschungen, p. 140, bottom; this is connected with the hadith
that 'before Allah the most despicable readers of the Koran are those who
visit the wicked emirs' (yazurun al-umara,', var. al.jawara), Ibn Maja, p. 23.
4. At.Nasa-'i. II, p. 139.
Ii E.g. Ibn Qutlubugha., p. 4. no. II; cf. the Recueil de textes et de traductions
publ. by the Ecole des langues orientales vivantes, 1889, I, p. 280.
, An example, Agh., V, p. 137, top.
T AI.Sarakhsi, Sharl} Kitii..b al.Siyar al·Kab!r, fol. 7b [I, I3}.
, Agh., V, p. '53, 4·
t The story in al.Mas'fidi, V, p. 458, is very instructive in this respect.
10 Al.Tirmidhi, I, p. 249, 4; Agh., VIII, p. 45, 14, cf. Yaqllt, Ill, p. 80, 5.
11 Cf. the passage in Part I, p. 130, note 3.
12 Agh., X, pp. 159, 3 from the bottom, 160.
13 Conciliatory theologians have endeavoured to prove the acceptibiIity of
the office of jndge under a sultan jii,'ir by theological arguments. The intra.
duction to the K. Adab al.Qagi by (d. 261), who was a practising
judge himself, is concerned with such proof.
1
\
,
i
J
\
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since he had always shown himself willing to co-operate with the
ruling powers.
!:Iadiths which were fabricated or, like the last example given,
sanctioned, on official orders did not invariably refer to the great
political and dynastic interests or the Umayyad house. Occasionally
the rulers desired to alter the rites in a way not in accordance with
pious Medinian tradition, and this easily aroused the opposition
of those gloomy circles. The official invention of hadiths under the
Umayyads would be used even for such trivial purposes. Pious
sayings were meant to break down the resistance of the pious and
to disarm them. Here is an example of such a case. As is well known,
on Fridays the Imam makes two speeches (khulba) to the assembled
community in the weekly general gathering. In early times this [41]
rite was carried out in the capital by the caliph himself. It is likely
that the humble rulers of the patriarchal epoch fulfilled this function
standing on a primitive platform (minbar);' and it is hardly con-
ceivable that of old it was so arranged that the speaker should remain
seated during this liturgical speech before the community. But
standing in front of the community was apparently not to the taste
of proud Umayyad princes. They did, however, value highly as-
cending the minbar as head of the people, and considered this pri-
vilege as an important part of their dignity as rulers, as is evident
from the panegyrics on the rulers of this dynasty. Mu'awiya is
praised as 'rakabu'l-manabiri waththiib"hii'2 after his death. The same
image, in which the pulpit fignres as mount and the ascending prince
as bold rider,' appears in a poem which b. Abi !:Iaf.a ad-
dressed to al-Walid after the death of his father 'Abd al-Malik:
The pulpits moumed On the dfl.Y that he ('Abd al-Malik) died; the
pulpits mourned the death of their rider;
When al-Walid ascended them as caliph, they said: 'this is his son,
in his image,' and they were quietened;
If after him (the father) another had knocked at the pulpits, they
would have reared and thrown him.'
1 [This is an error: the minbar was originally a kind of tribunal where the
bead of the community was seated. See C. H. Becker, 'Die Kanzel im Kultus des
altez:. Islam', Orientalische Studien Th. N6ldeke gewidmet, I, pp. 33Iff.= Islam-
I, pp. 450ft; H. Lammens, Etudes, pp. 203-8=MFOB, II, pp. 95-100.]
2 Agh., XVI, p. 34, 20; d. X, p. 62, I, about the beautiful spectacle when
Mu'awiya first ascended the minbar.
a. Cf. ibid.• X, p. 142, 2.
Ibid., IX.. p. 38, 18.ff. Their governors also greatly valued ascending the
m'tnbar, and In panegyncs addressed to them reference is often made to their
function on the minbar. Ziyad al·A'jam goes so far as to call a governor 'the
best who ascended the pulpit in fear of God after the Prophet', ibid., X, p. 155,
7 from the bottom. An emir of Mecca is praised as zaynu'l-manabiri yustash/a
bi.khutbatihi, Hudhayl., 256:46.
•
1 AI-Tabari, II, p. 70 uIt. [For the maq$ura d. Lammens, Etudes, pp. 202-3=
MFOB, II, pp. 94-5.]
2 AI-Ya'qubi, II, p. 57!, IS; Fragm. hist. arab., pp. 272, 14; 273. 8. Ibn
Khaldiln appears not to believe in the abolition of the maq$uras under the
'Abba-sids. but COnsiders this innovation of the Umayyads as a justifiable
institution belonging to the various privileges of the caliphate; he even calls it
SUllnat 'AlliihJf.'ibadihi, llrIuqaddirna, p, 225, 2,
3 Amab al-AshriiJ, p. 177; d. al.'!qd I, p. 295.
"Al.Ya'qubi, II, p. 283, J5.
5 Abli'I.Ma.l).asin, I, p. 78, ann. 93; p. 350, ann. 132. ['Metal' is due to an
error; for Z.adid read jadid, as pointed out by Becker, p. 396.]
6 A reaction to this is the saying ascribed to the Prophet in 'which he forbade
his companions to erect stone minbars, Ibn I;fajar, IV, p. 188.
7 For the primitive minbar ascended by 'Ali in Kilfa, see al.I:Iariri, Durrat,
P·I33.
8 Abu'l.!'tfaq.asin, I, p. 76. In the year 161 the 'Abbasid al·Mahdi ordered the
But their aristocratic arrogance-if the mind of those proud
Qurayshites is pictured-seems to have revolted at the idea of stand-
ing like hired preachers before their subjects. It was also aristocratic
arrogance, strengthened by the fear of assassination, which caused
the first Mu'awiya to have boxes (maq$ura) constructed beside the
great mosques for himself and his court, contrary to custom, in
order to avoid mingling with the people.
l
This Umayyad institution
was abolished under the first 'Abbasids
l
according to some as early as
under al-Mahdi, according to others only under al-Ma'miin
2
The
manner of the khulba was altered for the same considerations. The
highest representative of power must be distiuguished from paid
khalibs aud the dignity of the regent was to be displayed before the
people even on this solemn occasion. The khutba itself gave them
considerable uneasiness, though they did not wish to renounce the
opportunity to parade at the head of the people. 'Abd al-Malik is
said to have given the reason for his early grey hair; 'How can I
avoid going grey if I have to expose my esprit to the people once a
week.'2 Thus they endeavoured to achieve all effect at least out-
wardly corresponding to thdr position as rulers. The first Umayyads
therefore introduced various alteration in the ceremony of the
khutba and its staging in such a way as to divest it of its ancient
democratic character. Mu'avviya had some steps added to the minbar
so that the representative of the ruling power should occupy, during
the act which was solemnly symbolizing it, a more elevated place
than was customary in democratic times.4. Fine minbafs, made even
from metal,S were constructed everywhere
6
in order to give the
caliph and his lieutenants more weight by a sumptuously set
"stage" for the khu§ba. In former times things were kept more
simple,7 and 'Vmar I destroyed a minbar which his gavenor 'AmI b.
al-'A$ had built in Fusjaj. (Perhaps this is a polemical invention
meant to protest against tendencies of a later time.)" Originally the
[42]
50
VOLUME TWO: CHAPTER 2
\
!
I
1
-1
,
;
j
,
1
J
i
i
I
1
;
i
:r
1
,
i
J
,
,
,
j
UMMAYADS AND 'ABBASIDS S1
khulba was gtven after the general prayer. Dnring the Umayyad [43]
period the caliphs began to give the khutba of the 'iii before the
faliit on the pretext that the people might disperse before heariug
what they had to say to the congregation.' It could have been
considered as degradiug for the government if the speech made from
the pulpit by the ruler or his lieutenant was not as equally well
attended as the liturgy itself. For prestige reasons the caliph was
now to give one khulba seated. That this meant a change of the rite
of the khulba is often confirmed by the historians.' But this seems
to have aroused the disapproval of pious people faithful to the
sunna and an official theologian had to be found in order to instruct
them:' Rajii.' b. I;faywa (d. IIZ), otherwise praised as a pious author-
ity-who was considered a sort of adviser in matters of conscience
iu the court of several Umayyad rulers,4 asserted that one of the old
caliphs, 'Uthmiin, upon whom the legitimacy of the dynasty was, as
is well known, founded, also used to stand duriug the first khulba
but delivered the second seated.' These circles said even of 'Ali that
he delivered the khulba seated; it is, however, iutercstiug to observe
that the significance of this account was already obliterated by the
third century, when the victory of the sunna had rendered the
stoutly independent attitnde of the old Arab rulers no longer com-
prehensible, and that even al-Jal.>il' is only capable of giving a very
naive cxplanation,6
How far-reaching were the falsifications inspired by the Umay- [44]
yads in the interests of the privileges claimed by them is evident
from the fact that they not only cited 'Uthman, but even the
1 According to a report in al.Tirmidhi, I, p. 105, II, p. '26, l\Iarwan first
introduced this alteration. AI.Ya'qiibi, II, p. 265, cr. Abu'l-Fadij, Histona
Dynastiarmn, ed. Pocock, p. J94, names Mu'awiya as its founder. The pro·'Alid
historian gives as the reason for this change that the people left the mosques
after the §aliit in order not to be present at defamations of 'Ali in the khu{ba.
2 Al.Ya'qo.bi, IT. p. 341, 4. Also the governors, Ibn I;Iajar, III, p. 142
(referred back to an earlier time).
a Fragm. kist. arab., p. 64, 2. It is remarkable how great a part is ascribed
to this Raja: in building a new mosque in Jerusalem, which was to serve for
the repression of the pilgrimage to Mecca, ZDPV, XII, p, J83, d. Orient and
Oecide'nt, I, p. 448.
Fragm. kist. arab., p. 7: anna R.b.H. Yawa lahwm
ibid., p. 187_
5 In Abfi'l.Mal).isin, I, p, 249 the matter is represented differently: it was not
Raja.' who invented the tradition; it was he who stated that other people made
it up in order to support Umayyad practice.
t Bayan, foL 20a, [i. u8J: yurldu biqawlihi qa'idan kh-u!bat al.nikal;;
here it is related on the authority of al-Haytham b. 'Adi that the khu!ba was
never given seated.
destruction of the minbars erected under the Umayyads and reduced them to
what was customary in patriarchal times, al·Tabari, III, p. 486.
Shahr and perhaps had proof that theologians in official position
were used-or were willing, without outward pressure, because of
their interest in the prevailing power-to put into circulation ten-
dentious traditions.
The fact that, amongst the l.tadiths that have been handed on to
us. in spite of their being of a preponderantly tendentious character,
the Umayyad ones are not well represented is no proof that they did
not exist in a much greater number than they are found in our
various collections. Tendentiousness in the field of l.tadlth did not
only consist in making new traditions but also included the sup-
pression of existing party arguments. For this we have found
examples also in the Umayyad camp. There is no doubt that there
existed also a large number of tendentious dynastic traditions
in favour of the Umayyads, communications in which the praise and
fame of the founder of the dyna,sty, who was one of the Prophet's
companions, as well as of persons and families who supported the
Umayyad government, were made into objects of piety, as was later
the case with the memory of the persons on whom the family
traditions of the hostile dynastic parties were founded. If we bear
in mind, however, that the consolidation of the study of traditions
continued under the 'Abbiisids, we will understand that utterances
friendly to the Umayyads, to the founder and supporters of their
dynasty-such as have been preserved, e.g. in the tradition of Islam
not approved ecclesiastically-vanished from the mouths of the
traditionists.'
!
The example of one l.tadith may show us of what nature were these
tendentious traditions of the Umayyads. It apparently has the
purpose of glorifying the position of the Umayyad statesman
Khiilid al-QasrI (a successor of al-I:Iajjaj), who was abhorred by all
true believers. In the Arab manner this is achieved by putting the
ancestors of Khiilid in favourable relations with the Prophet. The
following l.tadith does this:
Asad b. Kurz (the assumed ancestor of Khiilid)2 was converted to
Islamin company with a man olthe tribeof Thaqaf. He presented the
Prophet with a bow, and when he handed over this gift the Prophet
asked: '0 Asad, where did you get this wood?' 'It grows in our
mountains in the Sarat.' Thereupon the Thaqafite asked: '0 apostle
of God, does this mountain belong to us or to them (the B. Asad)'
The Prophet replied: 'Verily, this mountain is the Qasr mountain
from which Qasr b. 'Abqar (ancestor of Asad) took his name." Then
Asad said: '0 emissary of God, bless me.' The Prophet said: '0
, Agh., XVI, p. 34.
2 Cf. Part I, p. 188.
S See Ibn Durayd. p. 302, 7. There seems to be a corruption in the Aghanf
text: hiM summiya Ibrahim Qasr 'AbqaY.
52 VOLUME TWO: CHAPTER 2
Prophet as their examples, and that opponents of these falsifications
make Jabir b. Samura, a Companion of the Prophet, conclude his
description with the words: 'He who tells you that the Prophet
delivered the khulba sitting is a liar."
IV
If so much trouble was taken by authority to find theological
support for such trivial ritualistic details, how much greater
have been the activity shown by the machinery of government In
cases concerned v-lith spreading among the masses traditional
authority for political and dynastic interests. The greater part of the
traditions invented for these purposes were probably due to official
initiative and influence. It is expressly reported of the great general
al-Muhallab, the scourge of the Kharijite dissenters (d. 83), that he
was concerned with falsifying traditions to encourage his soldiers
against these mutineers.- Amongst high officials of the Umayyad
dynasty there are several who are accounted as mubaddithun; to
name only I:Iaf. b. aI-Walid al-I:Ia<;lramI (d. 1z8) and 'Abd al-Ral.t-
man b. Khalid (d. 1Z4).3 Amongst traditions which the mau"lii
Layth b. Sa'd spread on the authority of the latter there are pre-
sumably many which were to benefit the prevailing political ten-
dencies, because this 'Abd al-RaJ.tman was for years an important
official of Umayyad princes. Al-Nasa'is strict criticism is lenient
towards him, which might not have been the case if al-Nasa'i had
been more closely acquainted with the circumstances. This fact is
curiously illuminated by an unintentional, and naive, saying of
Ibn 'Awn (d. lSI). This refers to Shahr b. I:Iawshab (whose date of
death is uncertain; either 98 and IIZ); he was considered unreliable
in his communications because he had accepted a govtrnment post.
4
[45] This view is telling that tendentious traditions were
smuggled in through official initiative. Latera the real understanding
for this phenomenon was lost and al-Bukhari declared Shahr to be
worthy of credit since nothing bad was known about his character.
6
People who were nearer to the conditions of the time could judge
things differently, like Ibn 'Awn who lived but a few decades after
1 Abu Dawftd, 1, p. 109, al-Nasa.'i, p. 215:fa·man baddathakum anna rasilla·
lUihi kama yakh{ubu qii'idan jaqad kadhaba_
Z AI-Mubarrad, p. 632, 14; Ansab ai-Ashraf. p. 106, 2.
8 Abft'l.Ma'Qasin, 1, p. 293. 309, ct. p. 325_
'" In al.Tirmidhi, II, p. II7-
Ahmad b. Hanbal considers Shahr as not worthy of consideration. ai-
Tirmidhi, II, p_ '16.
4 We find Shahr as an authority in innumerable 1).adiths. e.g. ibid., I, p. 327,
352; JI, pp. n, 81, 88, 97, 210, 244, 26o, 267. etc.
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UMMAYADS AND' ABBASIDS
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[46]
a cause which was in their conviction a good one.
1
The most favour-
able explanation which one can give of these phenomena is pre-
sumably to assume that the support of a new doctrine (which corres-
ponded to the end in view) with the authority of Muhammed was
the form' in which it was thought good to express the high religious
justification of that doctdne. The end sanctified the means.
s
The pious Muslinls made no secret of this. A reading of some of
the sayings of the older critics of the tradition or of the spreaders
of traditions themselves will easily show what was the prevailing
opinion regarding the authenticity of sayings and teachings handed
on from pious men. al-Nabil, a specialist in the study of
[
tradition (who died in B".ra in 2I2 aged 90), said openly: 'I have
come to the conclusion that a pious man is never to lie in
matters of the 1)adith.'4 The same has also been saId by hIS EgyptIan
contemporary Ya1)ya b. Sa'id al-Qattan (d. I92),' An acknowledge-
ment of this general experience is frequently applied to individual
mu/taciciitMn. Waki' says of Ziyad b. 'Abd Allah that he lies in
hadlths' despite his nobility (ma'a sharajihi). This being so, smaller
in the isniicl, obfuscations, had to be treated more leniently.
It happens frequently that Muslim critics find themselves in the
position of having to testify with regard to the most respected
religious authorities that they unconcernedly practised the tacilis,'
a most leniently judged' fonn of the ciolus (the two words are
connected etymologically)' which, it is true, did not influence the
essence of the 1)adith. Yazid b. Harun (d. 206) reported that during
his time in Kufa all spreaders of traditions were muciallist7n
lO
with the
exception of one whom he names. If this assessment is perhaps too
severe, it is enough to consider that even men such as the two
Sufyan (b. 'Uyayna and al-Thawnl" and others (who otherwise were
1 Li.nusJ·at al.sunna, 'to support the sunna', as it was said, d. Lileraturgesch.
derShi'a', p. 12.
2 Cf. the pertinent observations of Snouck Hurgronje in RHR, XX (1889).
p. 77 [= ·Vcrsprcidc Geschr., VI, pp. 8p-7]; Mecca, II, p. 202.
a Cf. Dollinger. Akademische Fortriige, I, p. x68, 'Such fabrications . . .'
• AI· Khatib aI-Baghdadi, fol. 25 b; [ed. Hyderabad, p. 84] ma ra'aylu al·
$iiliZl yakclhibft shay' akthar min al·ZladUh.
l> Muslim, introduction, p. 48; cf. Noldeke, Geschichte des Qorans, [Gottingcn,
1860J p. XXII.
G Al.Tinnidhi, I, p. 203, 14.
-; Cf. JASH, 1856, p. 218, note; Salisbury, p. 92, I; Risch, p. 20; Sprenger,
Mohammad, III, p. XCIX, translates it 'dishonesty'.
a AI.Khatib ai-Baghdadi, fo1. 99 [ed. Hyderabad, p. 361] The mudallisun are
differentiated fromactual liars, al-kadkaba: Ahlwardt's Landberg.Samml. no. 149.
g Frlinkel, Aram. Frenldw., p. 188; dalsa is synonymous with khad'a, aI·
Mas'udi. IV, p. 302, ult.
10 AI· Khatib aI·Baghdadi, lac. cit.
11 Taqrib, fo1. 40a [naw' 12 trans!. M. Marcais, JA, 9th Ser., XVI (1900), p.
523]; cf. Ibn Khaldiin, Muqaddima, p. 268, 4.
54 VOLUME TWO: CHAPTER 2
God, let thy victory and the victory of thy religion take place
through the offspring of Asad b. Kurz." . .
The last words without doubt show the cause of the fabncalJon
of this hadith. The deeds of KhaJid, his siding against the 'Alids
and his' action against the pious Muslims were to be justified as
furthering the cause of Islam. Such stories had to disappear in the
days of the 'Abbasids. . .
Official influence did its utmost to prevent the glorificatlon of the
memory of the 'son of Hind'. When we hear of that he
sent an announcer into the streets in order to declare In the name
of the caliph 'that he refuses his protection to anyone who
Mu'awiya favourably:2 we may conclude first that as late as dunng
Ma'mun's time there were still traditions current among the people-
perhaps attached to pious authorities-whic!,. redounded to
Mu'awiya's honour; as the people of Damascus stillm the thIrd cen-
tury demanded such 1)adiths from al-Nasa'i (d. 303) in a decidedly
importunate manner;3 secondly that there was official pressure. to
eradicate such things. For example. al-Bukhari
4
can no longer gIve
any manaqib of Mu'awiya as sound 1)adiths, though no doubt
existed in the Umayyad period; but these as well as anythmg
[47] friendly to the Umayyads were officially suppressed and de.stroyed.
In contrast, a large number of :Q.adiths were circulated which were
intended to show the people the unworthiness of that dynasty. A
typical collection of such anti-Umayyad 1)adiths made at the
time of the caliph al-Mu'ta<;lid (248) and worked up mto an edIct m
which this ruler intended following the measures of al-Ma'mun,
just mentioned, to order the cursing of Mu'awiya as a ritual act.'
v
So far there have been repeated references to the tendentious
fabrications of traditions during the first century of Islam and in the
course of our further account we shall continue to meet this method
of producing religious sources. It is a for psychologists .to
find and analyse the motives of the soul whICh made such forgenes
acceptable to pious minds as morally justified means of furthering
'Agh., XIX, p. 54: Yaqot, IV, p. 93·
2 Fragm. kist. arab., p. 370, 14. ct. Abo.'I-Ma'Q,asin, p. 6x7, penult.
s ya.qut, II, p. 777, x7 if. . ._ .
• B. Maniiqib, no. 36, contains a few notes only about Mu
6 Tab, III, pp. 2r70 fl, cf. section v of the next chapter. [For the dIfferent
towards the memory of Mu'awiya cf. Goldhizer in ZDMG. I, pp.
97-128, 493; LIlI, pp. 646; H. Lammens, Le ealifat de Yazi"d Ier, p. 14=
M FOB, IV, p. 246; Ch. Pellat, 'Le culte de Mu'a.wiya au HIe sIccle de
I'Hegire', Studia lslamica, VI (1956), pp. 53 fl., with further references.]
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[48]
VOLUME TWO: CHAPTER 2 UMMAYADS AND \ ABBAS IDS
57
praised as reliable in 1)adith and ofpnnctilious piety in their conduct)
were nevertheless included in the list of the mudallisin.'
The Muslims of the second century were fully aware that to derive
a saying from Muhammed was merely a matter of form for acknow-
ledging validity and that among the 'good' 1)adiths many were false.
They made the Prophet himself make this observation in a 1)adith
which characterizes the circumstances very tellingly. 'After my
departure: says the Prophet, 'the number of sayings ascribed to me
will increase in the same way as sayings have been ascribed to
previous prophets. What therefore is told to you as a saying of mine
[49J you will have to compare with the Book of God (the Koran), and
what is in accordance with it is by me,2 whether I have in fact said
it myself or not (fa-huwa 'anni qultuhu aw lam aqulhu)." It would
have been impossible to state more openly that the important
thing was not so much the actual authenticity of a saying but its
religious correctness, and that it is permissible to hand down sayings
and teachings in the name of the Prophet which in fact he had never
uttered. 'What is said of good speech I have said myself-the
Prophet is made to put this principle in an even more general form
(ma qUa min qaulin hasaninfa-ana qultuhu).'
These principles, which came to be formulated as facts of experi-
ence only some decades later, assisted consciously or unconsciously
in the formation of tradition and explain the essence of the 1)adith
in its fabricated connection with Mumammed.
The possibilities which the Muslims admit themselves in this field
are evident from a tradition in which the authorities seem to give
away the secret quite unconsciously: 'The Prophet,' it says in a
tradition in al-Bukhari,5 'gave the order to kill all dogs except
hunting and sheep-dogs.' 'Umar's son was told that Abu Hurayra
also hands down the words: 'but with the exception of farm dogs as
well.' 'Umar's son says to this: 'AbU Hurayra owns cornfields: i.e.
he has a vested interest in handing down the order with the addition
that farm dogs should be spared as well. This remark of Ibn 'Umar
is characteristic of the doubt about the good faith of the transmitters
that existed even in the earliest period of the formation of tradition.'
1 Abu'I.!\1al).a.sin, I, p. 507, H, d. Ibn Khaldo.n, p. 263, 3.
Examples for tadUs: al.Tirmidhi, I. p. 242, 19, II, p. 26o, 14; 290, 12.
2. Even that is not always so. In B. Tibb, no. 19. the Prophet is made to teach
that man is not savcd by his own good works but by God's grace (Zan yudkhiZ
alzadan 'amaZuhu'Z.jannata) , in direct contrast to S'Qra 7:41; 16:34; 43:7"2.
s AI. Bayan, fo1. I14 b. [II, p. 28, d. Schacht, Or£g£ns of Muh. Jurispr"
pp. 28, 45, 253-4]·
(, Ibn l\Hija p. 4, 9·
$ayd, no. 6; d. Harth, no. 3; o.l-Tirmidhi, I. p. Z8T, 17.
G This passage must be considcred in relation to the evidence which makes
it clear that in earlicr times Abft Hurayra was not considered an authority
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The historian is, however, more interested in the objective than in
the subjective side of this phenomenon and in the effects that such
fabrications had upon the circles for whose edification and instruc-
tion they were meant. '
It seems that teachings presented as sayings of Muhammed were
received as snch without much probing into the credentials which
songht to prove them to be the oral teaching of the Prophet. The [SOJ
carelessness and credulity of people in those days and in those
circles are showu in a phenomenon related to matters of tradition
which demonstrates even more characteristically the facility with
which the quotation of testimony from early times was undertaken.
In order to fix certain legal norms, recourse was had not ouly to the
fabrication of oral traditions but also to the production of written
documents which were to be taken as the expression of the wishes
of the Prophet. Such documents found easy credence at that time.
In the case of a copy, nobody thought of asking for the original, let
alone of investigating its credentials.' How far enterprising falsifiers
dared go is shown for example in the story that, duriug the time of
the last but one Umayyad ruler, the copy of a hilf document was
produced by people who sought to reconcile the northern and
southern Arab factions; this document was alleged to have been
drawn up on the occasion of the solemn alliance between the Yemen-
ite and Rab;'a Arabs at the time of Tubba' b. Malkikarib, far back
in the Jahiliyya; it was claimed to have been preserved by a des-
cendant of the last independent I;Iimyarite prince liVing at Kufa
and its text is given in fUll." It was not difficult to find credence for
more recent documents amongst people who were impressed by
such productions. It happened for instance that the tariff for the
tax for large and small livestock had to be fixed. Different
traditions about this were in existence but it was not convenient to
derive texts, in which numbers played a decisive part, from the oral
tradition of zealous collectors. One quoted eVen from the oldest
times written instructions for the tariffs of tax and ransom money
It is not possible to find out whether the treaties of the Prophet quoted as
wntten documents are an exception as to the authenticity of tbeir wording.
\V. Muir has supported his assumption of their genuineness with convincing
arguments: Mahomet, I, p.lxxxii (now cf. ¥lellhausen, Skizzen 'Und Vorarbeiten
'
II Abo. 1;:Ian 'Din', pp. 352 f. It is notable for the questions dealt with in Part
I. pp. 68 and 226-7 that in this document the ratification of the /,Jilf in the
following way: the contracting partics 'mixing their blood, add wine to it and
drinking it, cut their forelocks and nails, which the king throws into the sea
in a parcel,' ibid, p. 353, 9-II.
of much consideration. (Sprenger calls him 'an extremc in pious decep-
tion' Mohammad, III, p. Ixxxiii). The proofs for this are given in detail in
pp. 78-9.
58
VOLUME T\VO: CHAPTER 2
UMMAYADS AND 'ABBASIDS
59
which the Prophet gave to his various governors in all parts of
[51] Arabia.' It was these documents the contents of which the tradi-
tionists were considered to hand down orally.
But in the interests of traditional accuracy this was not deemed
enough. The documents themselves had to be shown, and several
seem to have been produced. The family of the first 'Uroar preserved
such a document, of which 'Vmar II, who endeavoured to follow the
tradition of the old caliphs in his acts as a ruler, had a copy made for
himself; Ibn Shihab al-Zuhri mentions this as an authentic docu-
ment.' Hammad b. Usama, a mawlii of the Quraysh tribe in Kilfa
(b. I2I, d. 20I), who was a fertile writer of traditions,' produced a
document furnished with the seal of the Prophet which he was said
to have obtained from a certain Thumama b. 'Abd Allah b. Anas;
Thumama deelared this document to be an original decree which
Abu Bakr addressed to Anas in the name of the Prophet when he
began his journey as tax collector (mu$addiq). This is a tariff con-
cerned with all kinds of tax and it is prefaced with the following
introduction: 'This is the obligation to pay tax which the Prophet
imposed upon the Muslims according to the order of Allah given to
His Prophet. He who demands tax of Muslims according to this law
('alii wajhihii), to him must it be given, to him who demands more
than that, it should be refused, ctC.'4 I:Iammad himself doubted the
genuineness of this document, as appears from his words: za'ama
anna Abii Eakr etc.; he (Thumama) pretended that AbU Bakr had
written this. 'Za'ama' (he believes) is as Arab scholars say, 'a kmzya
for the concept of lie.'5 This word is normally used as introduction
[52] to traditional statements (za'ama A. 'an E.) with the supposition that
it is rather doubtful that A really heard the contents of it from B.',
1 Tax tariffs for 11u'adh b. Jabal, K. al-Kharf1}, p. 31, 18; tariff of the ransom
money fixed in writing for' Amr b. !:Iazrn, al·Muwa{!a', IV, p. 30. In less well-
known l.ladiths other writwn communications by the Prophet are mentioned,
e.g. al·Tirmidhi, II, p. 268, 'Abd Allah, son of 'Amr b. shows a
in which the Prophet wrote down a d1t'ii' formula for Abu Bakr. Ibn Sa'd
(turn of the second and third century) talks of documents of Muhammed
and Abu Bakr which were kept in his days in the families of those for whom
they were made (in Sprenger, lASB, 1856, p. 326, no. 94. [Ibn Sa'd, II, pp.
3
8
fl. passim]. The descendants of Abii l)umayra show this document of
release, which the Prophet gave to their ancc<:itors, so the caliph al-Mahdr (aI-
Tabari,l, p. 1781, 6).
:I. Abu DawCld, I, p. 156.
3 Tab. I;luff., VI, no. 71-
e Abo. DawCld, I, p. 155. cf. Sprenger, JASB. 1856, p. 317. no. 45. [=al-
Khatib, Taqyfd, p. 87; for other passages see editor's note].
sIn aI-Damiri. II, p. 382, IS: li·kuUi shay'in kunyatun wa kunyatu'Z-kadhbi
za'amu d. ed. Guidi, p. 78.
n AbCl DawCLd, n, p. 99: yaz'umu 'an rasuli'lliihi; Yaq'CLt, IV, p. 306, 22:
za'ama AM lfiffiin 'an AM Mu'iidh.

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or it is used to cover reports which he who passes them on does not
himself quite believe.' An unbelieving Beduin says to Muhammed:
'Your emissary wants us to believe (za' ama lanii) that you are of the
belief (taz'umu) that we are obliged to observe five The
lexicographers, and even more the theologians, teach, however, that
za'ama also occurs in the general sense of gala, to say,3 Le. to com-
municate something bona fide as true. The former base this on the
formula commonly used by Slbawayhi, za'ama Khalil;' the latter
quote some examples of the l,1adith (za'ama Jibra'il, etc.)' It would
not surprise us if some Muslim commentator should attempt to
prove the authenticity of the document of Thumama from this point
of view.
VI
In order to evaluate the difference between the points of view of
Umayyad and 'Abbasid rule we must contrast the religious circum-
stances of the earlier epoch with the spirit prevailing after the rise
of the 'Abbasid dynasty. The change in the government of the
state which occurred after the downfall of the Umayyad dynasty can
be studied from many different vantage points, and whichever is
chosen the essential change in the circumstances of the new regime [53]
will be clearly evident. In the first part of this book we had the
opportunity to consider the national side of political life and to learn
that the national Arab character of the Islamic state declined with
the beginning of the 'Abbasid rule,' and foreign elements came to the
fore. The religious side of government, on the other hand, was much
strengthened. For this the foreign clcments which only gained
prevalence now were anything but a hindrance. The Persian mawiili,
not to name other elements, transferred their own religious traditions
1 E.g. Part I, p. 181, note 2; Yaqut, II, p. 343, 14: za'ama U ba'¢ aM biUliyat
Tani'; Abu l;Ianua Dinaw., p. 306, I6: 'He (Mukhtar) is a liar, he pretends
to honour Banu Hashim, whereas in reality he pursues wordly
interests'; ct. Agh., XI, p. 164, penult. Notice also prooimion to Bar Bahlul's
Lexie. Syriac., ed. Duval, I, c. 3., ult.
2 AI-Darimi, p. 87.=al-TirmidhI, I, p. 120.
In this sense za'im (al-qaum) is supposed to be 'speaker' and to belong to
the last group of words discussed by N6Ideke, ZDMG, XLII, p. 481: schoI. to
!:lam" p. 704, v.l: cf. also D. H. Muller, Burgen und Schlosser, II, p. 44, note.
• Kg. K. S'lbawayhi, n, p. 429, II; 436.9; 445, 4. etc.; za'ama Abu'l·KhaUiib,
p. 448. 1.
Ii AI-Nawawi, I,p.27; AbO:l-Baqa:, Kulliyyat, p. 200; de Goeje, Gloss. Fragm.,
s.v., p. 33; cf. B. Tatawwtl, no. 8;fa·za'ama .Mabmud annahu sami'a etc. The
Muslim exegesis declares here too za'ama=akhbara (al-QastalUinI, II, p. 387,
x) but from the concluding passage it is evident that the correctness of Mal}.-
mCld's saying is doubted.
6 AbU !:Ian. Din., p. 360, 15, and al-Maqrizi, cd. Vas, pp. 51, 56, may also be
adduced.
L
1 Agh., XXI, p. 10. It hardly needs proof that' Abd aI-Malik did not make
this remark himself.
SCf. above p. 40 Al.Farazdaq uses of Hisham b. 'Abd aI-Malik the epithet
mumaUak, Agh., XIX, p. ]5, 23, d. Mehren, Rketorik del' Al'aher, p, 17, I.
AI-WaIid b. Yazid, 'above whose forehead the light of mulk shines' says Ibn
Mayyada (Khizanat aI-Adab, I, p. 328, Ig).
$ Umayyad rulers are also occasionally called Imam: ]arir [DLwan, ed. al.
Sawi, p. 24, g] Fragm. kist. arab., p. 34, 3 from below=Hist. Ckalif Solejmani,
ed. Anspach, p. 41,4, d. Fl'agm., p. I45, 12.
4 In eschatology the seal (of Sulayman) and staff (of Moses) are put also in
the hand of the dabbat al·art!, al-Tirmidhi, II, p. 206, top.
r; AI.qat!ib wa-khatam al·kkila!a, F1'agm. kist. arab., p. 82, g. cf. p. 124, 3,
tI AI-Tabari, III, p. 455; al-Mas'udi, VII, p. 369, cf, F1'agm. kist. arab.,
pp. 341, 4, 415 penult. [Cf. also R. Basset, La Biinat So'ad, Algiers, 1910, pp.
30-1, and 'Burda' in EI 2nd cd.]
, Fragm, kist, arab., pp. 208, penult, 283, 5. It seems a fable that the
Umayyads already owned this treasure (al-Mas'udi, V, p. 188, 8, Ibn Hisham,
from their original environment into the new circles; they had only
to translate their inherited religious sense into Islamic idiom. They
were rather more fitted for this than were the original Arab elements
who inwardly rejected Islam and who had not been prepared by
their past to create a higher social and moral conception of life
from its seeds. Whereas the Umayyad rule was entirely secular-
with the exception of the episode of 'Umar II's reign-and was
little permeated by religious motives in its forms and aims, the
'Abbasid rule bore from the beginning the hallmark of a religious
institution. This had its root in the traditions of the Banii Hashim.
It is related that 'Abd aI-Malik said: 'While the poets praise the
BanG. Hashim for their religious practices, their prayers throughout
the day and night, their fasting and reading of the Koran, the same
poets in their panegyrics liken the Umayyads to roaring lions, steep
mountains and salt seas." This comparison is borne out byexamina-
tion of the relevant literature, of which we shall have the opportunity
to give a few examples below.
The Umayyad king' has his counterpart in the 'Abbasid caliph
in his character of a religious leader; though he was not at the apex
of a hierarchy, he was a hierarch himself, ruler not only of the state
but also of the state church. He surrounded himself with theocratic
attributes and wished to assert himself as Imam.' He felt himself to
be the successor of the Prophet in the spiritual leadership of the
community, the holder of a dignity established by God. The insignia
of the Umayyads were the sceptre and the state seal' and were
passed on in succession;' to this the 'Abbasids added the mantle,
al-burda, of the Prophet,' which is the one which the Prophet is
said to have presented to the poet Ka'b b. Zuhayr for his panegyric
BanaIStt'iid. The first 'Abbiisid caliph had already acquired this
relic,' which was inherited by his successors.
s
This mantle was worn
[54]
60
VOLUME TWO: CHAPTER 2
UMMAYADS AND < ABBASIDS
by them at the first paying of homage by their subjects,' at all
festive occasions, at solemn, and also martial, events.
2
In particular,
they appeared wrapped in this sacred relic while pertorming the
public before the community.' At important state functions,
when the mantle was not used as clothing it was spread in front of
the caliph.' It was quite different with the Umayyads: the king of
this dynasty did not consider it inappropriate to appear in fuJI
military annonr for the tid service..5 The bu,rda was meant to indicate
that the 'Abbiisids were the true caliphs and successors of the
Prophet: it was to represent the theocratic character of their cali- [55]
phate and to prove the exclusive right of the possessor of this relic
to the theocratic office, as against other pretenders. The prince and
poet 'Abd Allah b. aI-Mu'tazz used this argument in order to refute
the claims of the 'Alids.'
The 'Abbasids surrounded their sceptre with a theocratic nimbus.
They spoke of 'the light of the caliphate" and even of 'the light of
prophecy' which shines from the forehead of the prince.' It was said,
in these very words: 'Hariin ai-Rashid permitted himself to be
praised with things by which ouly the prophets were praised;
he did not disapprove of it and did not refuse it." Zealous admirers
when mentioning the caliphs use the eulogy" which otherwise is
permissible only after the name of the Prophet and is applied also to
'Ali and the 'Alids only by some zealous Shi'ites. Special blessing is
1 Probably also in earlier times, but my evidence for it is only from the
year 622 (enthronement of al·Zahir, after the report of an eye-witness in al-
SUyfiti, Ta'rikh, p. II, g.
! Recueil Seldj., II, p. 237, 5.
3 During fi?oding of (466) the caliph al-Qa.'im held a public
prayer of eXplatlOn. wrapped In the burda and carrying the qadib' Ibn al-
Athir, X, p. 34. . '
4 Recueil Seldj., II, p. 13, penult.: wa-biyadihi al·burda wa'/·qaqib.
" Yazld lJ. aI-Walid; al-Suyliti, Ta'rf,kh, p. 98, 4, bottom..
• al·Din, Ckron, Mekka, p. 154, 8. [Diwan, Cairo, 1831, p. 6, I5J. The
pro.'Ahd poet;;afi aI-Din al-I;iilli (d. 750) refuted the poem of Ibn al·Mu'tazz
in a poem composed in the same rhyme-form and the same metre' from it the
points of controversy between the 'Abbasids and the 'AUds can 'be seen; at·
Kutubi, Fawat al-Wafayat, I, pp. 243 f.
1 al.Maw!?ili, Agk., V. p. 116, 7.
S Recueil Seldj., II, p. 237, 4.
$ Agh, XII, p, 18,8 from. the bottom.
10 Amir a/.mu'minin salawat Allah 'alayhi, Recueil Seldj., II, p. 240, uit.
ed. Guidi, p. 6, 7 from below, ZDMG, X p, 448, note 4); certain of which was
made up to prove its genuineness. At any rate, it is certain that the bin'da
is never met with in the Umayyad period as one of the insignia of the ruler,
a These insignia were carried off by Seljuk enemies under the caliph aI-
Mustarshid. Recueil de textes relatives Ii l'histoire des Seldjoucides, ed. Houtsma,
II, p. 242, I.
62 VOLUME TWO: CHAPTER 2 UMMAYADS AND 'ABBA-SIDS
said to emanate from the personal appearance and presence of the
caliph.'
Adherence to this sacred person is an integral element in Muslim
belief. 'He who docs not cling to the amin Alliih, "the confidant of
God"-by which the caliph is to be understood"-will not benefit by
the five ,alawiit." For the caliph of patriarchal times the epithet
'the best of the Qurayshites' was sufficient
4
(Abu Bakr refused even
[56] this on his accession),' but the 'Abbiisids have their court poets give
them a title which was othelWise applied only to the Prophet:' 'the
best of all creatures'.7 Eventually the caliphs hear this epithet
so often that they apply it to themselves in their own speeches.
8
The Umayyatls were overthrown by them because of their god-
lessness and opposHion to religion;9 this political upheaval, which in
the first instance was effected by Abu Muslim-the man with the
'cudgel for the unbelievers'lo-was meant primarily to be the
establishment of the pillar of din.
ll
The new dynasty became intoler-
ant towards the practice of other religions and this marks a morally
retrogressive step in comparison with the Umayyads.
12
The repre-
sentatives of the new regime give themselves the appearance, at
least outwardly, of having come to inaugurate government regime
1 There are many examples of this in the passages of the Seljuq chronicle of
'Imad aI·Din al.Katib al'!f?fahani (see aI-BundarI, ed. Houtsma), in which the
caliph, who \vas a powerless Shadow at the time of the events narrated in this
chronicle, now and then appears, e.g, barakat l;arakatihi, II, p. '289, ult. if.
! We meet this title also in the earliest times (address of the poet Hawdha
to 'Vmar I, Khiziinat al·Adab, I, p. 166, 23) and in respect of the Umayyad
ruler; al·Mas'lidi, V, p. 309, I, 458, 6; also of the Umayyads in Spain, al-'Iqd,
II, p. 360, II, 2I.
S AI.Namiri, of the caliph Harun al·Rashid: Man lam yakun bi'amini'lliihi
mu'ta!fiman fa.laysa bi'I-!fa1awiiti'l-khamsi yantafi'u, Agh., XVII, p. 14'2, 3;
the first heuristic is given differently in Agh., XII, p. 'la, 13.
G'Umam Kkayrtt Qurayshill; Abfi !;Ian. Din., p. 190, II.
6 Wa.lasltt bikhayrikwn, Tab" I, p. 1829,3.
f Even the Prophet rejects, according to a tradition, this address, which is
to be reserved for Ibrahim only, Abu Dawftd, II, p, 173. During pagan times
this titlo was much used in panegyric qWjidas, aI·N5.bigha, 18:5; 'Abd Yaghl:tth,
Agh., XV, p. 75, 23: khayr al.bariyyati wftlidan warahtan (cf. Zuhayr, 4:4=
Landberg p. 146, v. 2: khayri'l-bttdiili wa.sayyidi' l-(;.atj.ri) and in Islamic poetry
this free usage which the old poet had made of the title still finds echo, e.g.
Ibn Hisham p, 801, I; Agh., XI, p. 68, 21; ct. Yaql:tt, II, p. 886, 2.
1 With reference to aI·Amin, Agh., XXI, p. 17, 7, to al·Mutawakkil, Yaql:tt,
II, p. 87, 21; d, Tab, II, p. 20g8, 13.
8 AI-Qa'im says: n a ~ n u Banu'l-'Abbt'is khayru'l.nas, Recueil seldj. cd. Rout·
sma, p. 20, 17.
9 Abu :t;Ian. Din., p. 367, 18; al.Ya'qubi, II, p. 427,15.
10 Cf. Houtsma, 'Bih'afrid', in WZKM, lII, p. 36; cf. for haftr kt1bat, Agh.,
IV, p. 93, 21; van Guelder, Mochtiir, de valsehe profeet, p. 73.
11 Agh., XXI, p. 87, 2: wa-shidtarukna'l·dfni.
11 See an example in my article, ZDMG, XXXVIII, p. 674.
in the spirit of the Prophet and the old caliphs. 'The amir al-mu'
minin Muhammed has revived the sunna of the Prophet with
regard to what is pennitted, what forbidden'; thus the poet Marwan
b. Abi 1;Iaf.a, a client of the Umayyad MalWan b, al-1;Iakam, praises
the caliph al-Mahdi, and the latter was pleased to hear the compli-
ment. The princely reward of 60,000 dirham and exquisite clothes
were the reward of the poet for the panegyric of which this line is
the climax.' Apart from 'Umar II, such a poem could not have been
dedicated to any Umayyad; but al-Mahdi was not the only 'Abbiisid
to whomsuch praise could be applied."
The princes were keen to exhibit practical piety in this sense. [57]
Haughty behaviour seems to have been found ouly amongst the
first of the 'Abbii.sids and the Barmakii:ls contributed much to that.
But it is almost impossible to imagine, in reference to an Umayyad,
the humility said to have been shown byal-Mutawakkil, a monster of
cruelty and vengefulness. When this caliph pontificated before the
assembled people at the Feast of the end of Rama<;lan, the popnJation
were extraordinarily enthusiastic in their homage and thronged to a
depth of four miles to pay homage to the caliph as he entered the
mosque. When he returned to his palace he put a handful of dnst
upon his head,' saying: '1 have ,seen the cheering crowds and it
bents me now to be humble before God."
These caliphs submitted to the divine law even in respect of their
own persons, just as they required this of their subjects. Only under
the 'Abbiisids was it possible to award the epithet 'god-fearing' to the
caliph.' Even as early as in his time al-Man>;iir allowed a case that
one of his subjects brought against him to be decided by a judge of
the religious law. Few of the princes of the Umayyad dynasty
would have tolerated that, and a comparatively unbiased historian
of the two dynasties comments on this incident that the imams
excel the kings (probably meaning the Umayyad princes, see above,
p. 40) in that they willingly subordinate themselves to the or-
dinances of religious law (bi'l-tawiilju' ila awiimir al-shari'a).' This
must have enhanced their aura of religiousness.
It is true that during the fnll flowering of 'Abbasid rule the court
at Baghdad was not less gay than the Umayyad court at Damascus;
though even in this place of joy the pietist spirit takes hold-in the
harem of Zubayda (wife of Hariin al-Rashid) a hundred odalisques
1 Agh., IX, p. 45, 20: altyii amft'u'l-mu'min!na Mubammadun*sunana'l·
nabiyyi ltaramaha wa-lJ,alalaha.
S AI-Mutawakkil, above.
:s Cf. ZDMG, XLII, p. 590, note 3.
• AI·Tabar!, III, p. 1455.
6 Abo. Nuwas, in Fakhr al.Din al-Razi, in Freytag's Chrestom. Arab., p. 87, 3
from the bottom.
• Fragm. Joist. arab., p. 269, 9.
c
VOLUME TWO: CHAPTER 2
hum the Koran 'like a hive of bees''--in general little attention
is paid to the punctilio of the law. There is gay song and bold
drinking; while theologians dispute the badd of drinking wine the
[58] emir of the true believers and his courtiers indulge with singing
girls and gay persons in the forbidden beverage.' The caliph al-
Mutawakkil, who re-established the orthodox dogma which his
predecessors had impaired
l
was an immoderate drinker in his own
palace.
3
Kremer has described this side of Baghdad court life in a
vivid picture to which we refer readers.
4
But it must be remembered
that side by side with the inner life of the court there is, in com-
fortable contrast, a quickening religious interest, such as was in-
conceivable before, and yet diametrically opposed to this way of life.
In public and particularly in official life the religious law had to be
stdctly followed. Under the Umayyad caliphs a wine feast could be
held even in the mosque;' but this was unthinkable under the
'Abbasids. The caliph who leads a gay life with his courtiers does
not extend it beyond his palace. To the outside world he wishes to
be the imam, a representative of religious dignity and to carry out,
and have carried out, the religious laws.' The caliph al-Qahir (320-2)
who took strict measures against wine drinkers, singers
l
and singing
girls 'was hardly ever found sober'.' There were people who did not
overlook the hypocrisy implied in such behaviour: 'They (the caliphs
and their courtiers) drink wine while imposing legal punishment
upon other drinkers'-thus Sufyan al-Thawn is said to have charac-
terized the religious state of affairs in an outspoken epistle to Hliriln
al-Rashid.
8
A poet says: 'While his (Ibn Abi Duwad's) companions
drink into the early hours of the morning they profoundly investigate
the problemof whether the Koran is created."
A strong interest in problems of religious doctrine is patronized
from above. It is typical that even during a drinking bout religious
matters (fl amr ai-din wa'i-madhiihib) are discussed." Even the most
liberal-minded among the 'Abbasid caliphs, such as al-Ma'miln,
demonstrate their liberalism by fostering religious and dogmatic
[59] speculation. AI-Ma'miln himself is said to have written some
1 Abii'l-Mal;Liisin, I, p. 632, Sf.
2 Scenes such as Agh., XXI, p. 239, top, are among many such depictions
of tIlls time.
t See the story in Fyagm. kist. arab., p. 554, bottom, not to mention other
examples.
4. Cultuygesch., II, pp. 62-86.
5 AhCr.'l-Ma1}.asin, I, p. 242.
S Cf. Aug. Muller, Is1., I, pp. 470, 537.
1 Abu'!.Ma1}.a.sin, II, p. 254,
B Al.GhazaJi in al-Damri (s,v. al-faras), II, p. 256, I.
9 In aI.SuYUt'i, Ta'rikh, p. I42, S.
10 Agh., VI, p. 179.
UMMAYADS AND \ABBASIDS
theological treatises.> The apparently liberal teachings which the
'fanatical good sense' (a phrase of Karl Hase's)2 emanating from the
caliph's court wishes to establish, are spread by means of religious
fanaticism; not in the name of freedom of thought but in the belief
that these teachings correspond to orthodox dogma.
8
In the same
way their iconoclastic colleagues in Byzantium declared war against
the worship of images, not so much from motives of common sense
but in the name of the orthodox dogma. The inquisitors of liberalism
were possibly even more appalling thall their literalist brethren;
their fanaticism is certainly more repuguant than that of their
imprisoned and maltreated victims.
The Umayyad prince had a worldly education. From the Islamic
point of view some of the princes'were such as to make them utterly
unsuitable to lead the community in prayer and their testimony
invalid in the sense of the religious law.
4
It must have been a
peculiar atmosphere in which al-Walid II grew up, who hardly lIO
years after the Prophet answered the threats of the Koran against
'the stubborn opponents' (14:8,9)' by making the Koran the target
for his arrows, saying:
You hurl threats against the stubborn opponent, well then, I am"-
stubborn opponent myself.
When you appear before God at the day of resurrection just say:
My Lord, al-Walid has torn me up.'
In these people Arab paganism had survived. The theological
element has a large part in the education of 'Abbasid princes. Al-
Ma'miin had to listen to lectures by juqahii' and mubaddithin,' and
this explains his continued interest for the finer points of Mu'tazilite
dogma. When Harlin al-RashId heard of the great work of Muham-
mad b. al-:E;lasan al-ShaybanI on the Is]amic law of war, he sent the
princes with their tutors to hear the lectures in which the author [60]
delivered the contents of the book.
s
The 'Abbii.sids' interest in
canonical studies increased in the same measure as their political
1 Fihnst, p. n6.
11 Handbuch dey protestantischen Polemik (1St ed.), p. 321.
t Cf. ZDMG, XLI, p. 68, bottom. I
4 Fragm. kist. arab.• p. lSI, 5 from the bottom.
S Pious people seem to llave applied this phrase from the Koran to him,
V, p. 360, ult" as well as to Yazid I, Abii J:ianifa Dinaw,. p, 279, n,
to Mu'awiya T, al-:Mas'fidi, V, p. 99, 4, and to al-I;Iajjaj. ibid., p. 337, ult.
SAI-Mas''O.di, VI, p, 10, red. F, Gabrieli, in RSO, 1934, p. 41, no, 27]. There
are interesting facts about the freedom in religious matters of these Umayyads
in Agh., VI, p. 141, Fragm. kist. arab., p. 114.
1 II, p. Sal, 3; ct. Fragm. hist. arab., p. 321, II.
a AI-Sarakhsi in the introduction to his Shar[J, K, aZ-Siyar :f01. sa.,
[I, p. 4.]
66 VOLUME TWO: CHAPTER 2
UMMAYADS AND' ABBASIDS
influence was taken away by governors and usurpers.' The less they
were true kings the more they became imams. The less they had their
say in temporal affairs the more they adopted pompous theocratic
titles and granted high-sounding epithets (alqab) to their vassals
and followers? These alqiib were conferred by decree' and the same
method was followed in adding a new one to existing honorary
titles.'
Why do I see the Banu'I-'Abbas invent so many kunyas and
honorary titles?
Few are the drachmas in the hands of our caliph; therefore he
presents people with titles.'
Then was their custom ridiculed by the poet Abu Bakr al-
Kha.rizmi' in the fourth century. This example shows that at the
time when the caliphs had to give up their worldly powers in favour
of upstart vassals the poets dared to ridicule even the throne. Abu
Ya'li b. al-Habbariyya (d. 504).' who himself had the by-name of
al-'Abbasi, called the caliph in a satirical sketch: 'the poor Muqtadi,
without brains, understanding, orfeeling.'8
Historians of literature report of a Baghdad poet of the fifth
century, Hibat Allah b. al-Fa<jl b. al-Qattan (d. 498), that nobody
could escape his ridicule, Iii al-khalifa wa-lii ghayruhu, 'neither the
caliph nor anybody else."
[61] Among the signs of the enhanced theocratic dignity of 'Abbasid
rulers the most suggestive is the fact that the title khalifat Alliih,
'representative of God' (which occurs also earlier)" and other
synonymous designations became more and more general, even
1 A historian expresses this state of affairs: the caliph was maMiim 'alayki,
additamenta to Ibn Khallikan, ed., Wiistenfeld, I, p. 34. 2.
S Ibn Khaldiln. Muqaddima, pp. 190 ft.; ZDMG, XXVIII, p. 306; Kremer,
Geschickte der herrschenden Idem [des Islams: Der Gottesbegrifj, die Prophetic,
und Staatsidee, Leipzig, r868], p. 417. [See also al-Birilni, aI-Athar al-Biiqiya,
pp. t32 i., quoted by A. Mez, Die Renaissance des Isldms, p. 133.]
$ Cf. Derenbourg, Ousama ibn Mounkidh un emir Syrien, etc. I, p. IS, note 2.
... AI·Bayan al·Mughrib, I, p. 283. Later it happened that after the father's
death the son inherited the laqab of the latter, as is seen in Ibn Abi
II. pp. 26, log (fourth century Egypt).
I' Part I, p. 242.
tl Yatfmat al-Dahr, IV, p. I4S: ma U ra'aytu Banf,'l·'Abbiisi qad fatalJuJ
mina'l-kuna wa·mina'l.alqabi abwabii * qalla'l·darahimu if, kaffay khalijatina
/Mihda ja' anjaqafi 'j-aqwiimi algaM.
7 Cf. for his poetical work Derenbourg, Escur, I, p. 318, no. 474. [al-5iidih
wa'l.Bughim, see GAL I, p. 293, 51, p. 447].
S RecueilSeldj., ed. Houtsma, II, p. 65, II.
• Al.Kutubi, Fawatal.Wajayfit, II, p, 314, 25.
10 Regarding 'Uthman, I;Iassan b. Thabit. DJwan, p. 98. 15. ed. Hirschfeld,
XX, 9.]
popular.' When the Umayyads used this pretentious title
2
it was
merely intended to convey the unlimited power of the ruler. Under
the 'Abbasids
3
the title was filled with theocratic content in accord-
ance with their general view of the nature and duties of the cali-
phate.' The 'Abbasid caliphs considered themselves to he the
representatives of 'God's rule on earth'S and even as 'God's shadowon
earth'. The ruler was to personify the power of which it was taught:
al-sul/iinu ;;illu'lliihi ft'l-ar¢i ya'wi ilayhi kuUu malhUftn, 'the govern-
ment is God's shadow on earth, all those troubled find refuge in it."
What this sentence attributed to the Prophet taught about the
institution of secular authority, the 'Abbasids eagerly referred to [62]
their own person.
7
As late as the eighth century the puppet caliph
of Egypt gnarded by the Mamluk sultans is addressed in a ridiculous
document of homage as 'God's lieutenant on earth' (na'ib Alliih
fi ar¢ihi).8 From the 'Abbasid caliphs these pompous theocratic
1ln the Arabian Nights, 894, Bulaq, cd. 1279, IV, p. 198, 7, 5 from the
bottom, Maryam al·Zunnariyya is made to address the caliph Harun as
khalifat Allah ft aYfjihi; it is unnecessary to seek a polemic meaning in this
(ZDMG. XXXIV, p. 613).
Z Miskin al-Darimi's address to the Umayyads assembled round Mu'awiya I
is typical, BanJ Kkulafa'i·'llahi, Agh., XVIII, p_ 71, penult. According
to aI-Tabar!, II. p. 78, 10, the poet I:Iaritha b. Badr addressed Mu'awiya I by
this title; d. al-Mas'l1di, V, pp. 105, I, 152, 7, 330, 6 ('Abd in a song
of the camel.drivers 'Abd al·Malik is called khaUfat Allah. Agh., xv, p. 6, 12.
a Agh., III, p. 95, 5; IX p. 44, 4; XX! p. 128,5; al-Mawardi, ed. Enger. p. 22:
imam al·muslimln wa-kkalifat rabb al·'alam£n; al-'Iqd, III, p. 30, 3 from the
bottom; cf. ibid, p. 32, 14. Tab., III, p. 2177, 9: in an edict of Mu'taQ,id the
'Abbasids are called: kkulafii' Allah wa-a'immat
... Only later is this title found inadmissible by theologians in an entirely
theoretical discussion. who devotes a paragraph of his Mantkurat,
fo1. 323., to this question, finds that it is not permissible to use this title; only
Adam and David, who are called this in the Koran, have a claim to it. Ibn
Khaldfin also discusses this controversial question in an account of his theory
of the caliphate, Muqaddima, p. 159, 'PIt.
S Tab., III, p. 426, r6: says of himself: innama ana sultan Alliih
oar4ihi.
tl In al.Shaybani, K. al·Siyar, fol. 8b [I, p. 15,] = WfL, XL, p, 50, no. 24,
this sentence; according to Ansfib p. 33, top, the Umayyad 'Abd
aI-Malik already makes use of this saying, but it may be assumed that a later
opinion has been here dated back to an earlier period.[ Cf, Goldziher, 'Du sens
propre des expressions Ombre de Dieu, etc:. RHR, XXXV (1837)].
7 AI.Mas''Odi, VII, p. 278, ¥ill Allah baynahu wa-bayna khalqihi;
cf. ibid. VIII, p_ 135; al·pill al-imaml, Recue.it seldj., II, p. 242, 2; cf. aI·Tha·
'alibi, ZDMG, v, p. 180. no. 12. The Shi'ites call their al·zaman thus,
Kashkal, p. 88, 10.
s AI-Suyl1ti, Ta'7fkh, p. 198, penult. (Fakhr aI.Din aI·Razi calls Muhammed
in a passage of his Wa$iyya in Ibn Abi Uillaybi'a, II, p. 28. 9, na'ib Allah). This
title was given as easily as that of 'shadow of God'. Not only the sultans of
Morocco but also Indian princelets call themselves 'lieutenants of God'
[Verspre.ide Geschriften, ii, p. 208]. Snouck Hurgronje, Kritik der Beginse.len
v. V.d.E., 2nd part. p. 68.
2 a
.HZ
.. 2
1 The Persian poet Sa'di bestows this title upon the Ilkhan (siiya-'i-klmdii)
ZDMG, IX, p. 135 v. 80. [K'Ulliyyiit, cd. Furi1ghi, section gasii'id, p. 41, ult.]
as well as upon the Atabeg Mu?af[ar aI·Din b. Sa'd b, Zengi (Gfilistitn. d'lbiija,
ed. Gladwin, p. 7. 10). The Tartar prince Oljaytu (in Fleischer, Leip. Cat
p. 352:3.), in the same way as the later Tatar conqueror Mu1).ammad Shaybani:
is called by his panegyrist tingri sayasi and khalfja-i.Ral}man (Die Schej.
baniade. ed. Vambery, p, 22, v. 27, ct. ;iU·i.kuhda, ibid. p. 266, v. lOS). Ihe
same title was also given to the Mamluk sultan in Egypt, al.!:Iasan al-'Abbasi,
AthaY al- Uwal ji Tartib al.Dztwal, p, 69.
2 The prince in Andalusia was called thus, M. J. Miiller, GeschicMe
dey westlichen Araber, p, IS, 8. The modern philologist Faris al.Shidyaq ad-
dresses the Bey of Tunis: ;ill al·iliihi ZDMG, V, p, 252, v, 52.
8 The conqueror of Constantinople, Sultan MUQammad 11, is called 1!ill
Alliih 'alii'·l·'iUamfn in the introduction to his work (ed. Cairo p. 3. 18) by
MulHih Khoja-zfu..le (father of the famous Tashk6prU-zadc) who wrote, com-
missioned by the sultan, a dogmatic.polemic work entitled Tahlijt,r al-Fa-lii-
sija modelled on al·Gaza.li's work of the same title. Cf. also Qutb al-Din,
ChYon. d. St Mekka, pp. 4, 3 from the bottom; 6, g, 17; 330, 12; ZDMG, XIII,
p, 179, 21; XV, p. 3I9, 3. from the bottom; XLll, p. 577, v. 24; Melanges
orient. (Paris, 1883), p. 83, penult. II (1886), p. 75,
4 Fleischer, Kleinere Sckrijten, III, p. lI2.
Ibn al.Athir, VIII. p. 222, ann. 36r.
6 Abo.'I.!I·Ia1;t.asin, II, p. 294, 4 [al.Tannkhi, Nishwar al.:Mu!J.adara, II,
p. 196; Ibn al·Athirp. 319].
title3, which must have appeared to contemporaries the emptier
the less of real power corresponded to them, were at all times
and in all countries transferred to the real temporal rulers' and
were even applied to minor princelets by flattering courtiers.
2
The Ottoman sultans were, as the protagonists of Islam, thought
to have a special claim for adopting these titles of the old
caliphs,' just as the name khalifat Alliih was transferred to
them.'
Out of the wide field of political sovereignty the 'Abbasid ruler
had to be satisfied with the sadly reduced privilege of having his
name put on coins and hearing it resound from the pulpits (ai-sikka
wa'l-khutba). AIMuti' (334-63) finds himself in such a position that
he is able to answer Bakhtiyar when he came to ask the caliph for
funds to fight disturbances in the capital: 'In the circumstances I
am living in, when I have no right or say over the income of the state,
r am not obliged to provide the means for the Muslim's welfare;
this duty falls to those who have the power, r possess nothing
beyond the khutba." But even this last vestige of outward mani-
festation of rule had ceased by that time to indicate the power of the
ruler, as had happened under the Umayyads (ct. above, p. 50).
The humiliated caliph was unable to appear personaIIy in the place
of assembly at the head of his people in order to perform the sacred
rites, and al-Ra<;li (322--<)) was the last to ascend the minbar.'
Thus 'coin' and 'khutba' soon became synonyms for ridiculous
[63]
68 VOLUME TWO: CHAPTER 2 UMMAYADS AND' ABBAS IDS 69
formality and empty pretence' 'because, just as the names of the
real rulers (once even that of a woman who was able to call herself
'queen ofthe :MusIims', malikat al-muslimin)2 appeared next to those
of the caliphs on the coinage, so they were also mentioned from the
pulpit.
3
The imam compensates for the gradual decay of all his
worlcIly power by unctuous exhortations' which he addresses to the
incomparably mightier vassals in his capacity as religious head;
investing the vassal with the investiture valued by the latter' be-
cause the imam's sanction gives him an increased status before the
people. The recognition of the vassal's power is accepted as un-
disputed fact even by the caliphs, who at the most still have the
role of arbiter when there are disputes between various local rulers.
'
This office is exercised by the caliph in his capacity of spiritual head
of Islam. GraduaIly the ruler is displaced by the pontifex and the
representatives of this dignity increasingly emphasize the spiritual
character of their office, which impressed the people who had always
shown a tendency to consider the caliph's person as especiaIly
favoured by God's grace. 7
The belief that the person of the caliph was a support to the
order of the universe was much fostered. It was beIIeved, despite the
frequent experience of the caliph being murdered, that if he were
kiIIed it would disturb the course of nature, the sun would darken,
rain would faIl and all vegetation wither.
8
Even the mighty vassals
1 Towards the end of the Baghdad ,rule their originated the proverb: qani'a
jullin bi'l·sikka wa'l.khu#ba 'he was satisfied with the coin and Le. he is
roaster of something only in name, but has in reality no say; al·Fakhri, p. 38.
:I In the seventh century, the Egyptian princess Shajarat aI·Durr; for such a
dinar (in the British Museum) see Bulletin de l'Institut egyptien, series 2, no, 9
(r888). pp. "4fl.
II Examples of the siMa are afforded by the observation of coins of such
local rulers; I mention as example jRAS, 1886, p. SIS. The first whose name
was mentioned with that of a caliph in Baghdad in the was the Buyid
'Aq.ud al-Dawla, Ibn al.Athir, VIII, p. 229, ann. 367. [ed. 7homb, VIII,-p,
229], A Buyid boasts: Asma'tma ft·wajhi kuUi dirhaminfwa-fawqa kuUi
minbarin li-kha#ibi (Yatbnat al-Dahr. II, p, 6). In the provinces the regent's
name was also mentioned in the khutba before the date given above. AI-
Mutanabbi says of Say! al.Dawla that his name sounded from all pulpits, was
missing from no dinar or dirham (Rosen·Girgas. A'Yab. Chrestom., p. 544, v. 9).
In the capital the privilege of the caliphs seems to have been respected for
longer, Interesting details about the circumstances in Egypt are to be found
in al-Suyftti, Ta'r'lkh, p. 200, q; Athar al·Uwal. pp, IIg--20.
4 E,g. Recue-il Seldj., II, p. 174. bottom.
,. See the account in Kremer's Herrschenden Ideen, pp, 417 f. Muslim princes
reigning in far.away countries asked for investiture even from the Egyptian
'Abbasids; an interesting account is in Ibn Batj:nta, I, pp. 364 if.
a E.g. in Freytag, Chrestom, arab. P.1I3, II; ZDMG, VIII, p. 8Ig.
, According to Fragm. kist. arab., p. lor, II, the people believed even at an
early date in the superstition that the caliph was immune from plague.
S Al.Fakhri, p. 166.
[64]
1 Ibn Khaldiln, Muqaddima, p. 174, 9.
z Recueil.seldj., II, p. 152, 21; 236,9.
a Ibid, p. 247, ult.
4. Gi1!istau, VIII, no. 105, ed. Gladwin, p. 249.
Al.Ya'qubi. II, p. 617, 9.
8 Cairo Cat. III. p. :2:24; Hilya! al·'Ulamii: ff, Madhiihib al·Puqaha [GAL I,
p. 489, S I, p. 679].
, JA., 1877, I, p. 42 [ed. Goldziher, Streitschrijt des Gazali gegen die Batinijja.
Sekte, (Leiden, 1916)].
8 ZDMG, XLI, p. 64. note 3. AI-Muqtan (S3O-SS) goes even further.
(RecueiISeldj .• II, p. 216) as the pupil of an eloquent theologian.
$ Ibn al-Athir, IX, p. 155.
who in reality held the caliph a prisoner, seem to have attached to
the latter's person some sort of awe, as Ibn Khaldiin says: yadinuna
bi-fii'ati'l-khalifati tabarrukan, i.e. they profess obedience to the
caliph hoping to gain thereby religious blessing.
'
They thus hesi-
tated to attack the powerless inmate of the caliph's palace at Bagh-
dad and considered opposition to him as ill-omened (shu'm).2 It
was thought that to go to war against the imam was tantamount to
fighting God.' Only thanks to such superstitious fear did the vestiges
of the caliph's authority survive until HtilagU Khan had the last
Arab rnler at Baghdad executed. Then it was seen that in the words
of the Persian poet Sa'di-'the Tigris continued on its normal course
at Baghdad even without caliphs."
These conditions begin to prevail during the third century and
become more firmly entrenched in relation to the development of
political affairs. The decline of power is matched by the increase of
theological interests. At the court of the caliph al-Muhtadl (255) the
theologians-these being the ahl al-'il_are the most respected
persons.' AJ-Mustal'hir (487-5I2) compensates for the superior
power of his Seljuk vassals by having the theologian AbU Bakr
al-Shashi al-QaffaI write a work on the points of difference among
the madhiihib al-fiqh, which also bears his name (al-Musta;hiri);'
he also commissioned al-GazaIl to prepare an exposition of the
teachings of the Ta'limiyya.' In the year 5I6 the successor of this
prince attends the theological lectures of Abu'I-FutuJ.> al-Isfara'ini. 8
In order to gain an idea of the interference of the caliph in
affairs at the end of the fourth and beginning of the fifth century
it is enough to consider the administrative activities of caliph
aI-Qadir bi'llahi (38I-422). This ruler is chosen because he was said
to have strengthened the central government; he is said to have
diminished the influence of Turks and Daylamites, to have revived
the authority of the caliphate and to have known how to command
obedience and respect.' But in the varied destinies of his empire his
influence is nowhere to be encountered. The historian whose words
were just quoted could give no other examples of the administrative
[65]
7
0 VOLUME TWO: CHAPTER 2
•
UMMAYADS AND' ABBASIDS 71
measures of this caliph, praised as energetic, than the following. He
reprimanded the Mu'tazilites and Shi'ites and other dogmatic
dissenters (arbiib al-maqiiliit);' in a written decree he forbade Buyid
Jaliil al-Dawla to let the drums be beaten during the canonical
prayers, though this decree had to be revoked" and his successor
was forced to grant the title malik al-muluk to this Buyid (even the
theologians were not allowed to object);3 and a preacher who
pronounced the kh"fba in incorrect form was subjected to discip-
linary investigation.' The caliph himself wrote a book on Sunnite
belief.'
The less real power the Baghdad court had, the more did the
theologians ponder on the canonical law of the state, which so
beautifully delineated the powers of the caliph in a theoretically
definitive way at a time when the caliphate in fact had only the
ideal character of imam. It was at this time that al-Mawardl com-
piled his classical handbook of public law.' It is true that he had to
take the circumstances of his time into account and devote a
paragraph to the question of the status of the caliphate of a rnler
'who is hindered in exercising his. rights and one of whose assistants
seized power in order to administer independently the affairs of
state, without, however, open rebellion against the caliph."
VII
From the above account it is evident that the rnle of the 'Abbasid
dynasty favoured the development of religious law and the cnltiva-
tion of public law in the religious spirit, dUring the time of its
flowering as well as in the epoch of its decline when the troubled
circumstances of the time gave more and more scope for the influence
of pietist elements. At the apogee of this dynasty, when its repre-
sentatives exercised full power of government,' development in this
1 A.H. 408, ibid, p. II4.
s A.H. 418, ibid. p. 135.
• A.H. 429. ibid p. 171; cf. Enger, De vita et scriptis Maverdii commentatio
(Bonn, 1851). pp. :2 f.
Ibn al-AthIr, IX, p. 148.
I Ibid.. p. 155: kitiiban 'ala madkkabi'l-sunnati. The contents of this
work are more closely defined by Ibn in al.Suyiiti's Ta'rikh. p. 165:
'He discussed in it the excellences of the companions, the unbelief of the
Mu'tazilites and those who teach the created nature of the Koran; this book
was read every Friday in the assembly of the al·!:Iadith in the Ja-mi'
al-Mahdi in the presence of many listeners.'
I The points of view of this system of public law are set out in Kreme-f's
Herrschenden Ideen. pp. 420 ft. [Cf. H. A. R. Gibb, <AI·Mawardi's Theory of
the Caliphate,' Studies in the Civilization of Islam, pp. 15I ff.]
'1 Ccm.stitutiones ed. Enger, p. 30, bottom.
• It is reported in the name of the contemporary Mul}.ammad b. Sala.m of
O'
[66]
7
2 VOLUME TWO: CHAPTER 2 UMMAYADS AND 'ABBASIDS
73
[67] sense was encouraged by a stressing of the religious character which
the caliph assumed in contrast to their predecessors. It was in
accordance with this religious spirit that theologians of the epoch
adopted an attitude of instruction towards the court and, corres-
pondingly, the rulers gave, in accordance with that instruction, a
religious bias to the administration of law and government. Malik b.
Anas addressed a letter to Hilliin al-Rashid' containing exhortations
and advice (it seems that this letter is preserved in a manuscript
in the Escurial).' The same caliph asked the theologian AbU Yiisuf,
a most eminent pupil of Abii I;Ianifa, to furnish him with a memor-
andum about the regulation of taxes and the administration of the
state in order to put a stop to the arbitrariness which had prevailed
under the Umayyad rulers. The caliph's invitation is no longer
extant but when the book in which Abii Yiisuf attempted to carry
out the task is studied, the points of view prevalent in public life
at that time become evident. He exhorts the amlr al-Mu'minin'
as follows: 'I recommend that you guard what God has entrusted to
your vigilance and watch over what God has given into your care;
you should pay regard in these things only to Him. If you act
contrary to this, the smooth paths of right guidance will become
rough for you, your eyes will lose the light and the traces will be
blotted out, so that the easy roads will narrow and you will approve
what is objectionable and object to what should be approved. Fight
with your own soul as one who is fighting for victory for its own good,
not its disadvantage. For the shepherd who loses part of his flock
must make up what his negligence has damaged.... Beware, then,
that your flock does not come to harm, because the owner of the flock
may demand compensation from you for the damage and indemnify
himself out of your wages for what you have lost. A building must
be supported before it collapses. What you do for those given by
God into your care will be to your advantage; what you neglect will
be to your dIsadvantage. Therelore -do not f-crg-et to be tr...e -caretaker
1 Fihrist, p. 199, 4.
2 Derenbourg. Escur., I, P.384, no. 556, 3 [Ed. Bulaq. 1311, GAL I. p. 186; the
authenticity of the text is. however, uncertain, cf. EI, S.v. 'Malik b. Anas.']
:: R. al·Kharad p. 3, bottom.
the caliph The caliph was asked whether after having obtained so
many wordly goods there was anything desirable that remained. To this he
Vlas said to have answered: 'I have still one unsatisfied wish: to be seated upon
a ma$taba surrounded by students of tradition, while the famulus (mustaml'J.
cf. Kremer, Ge.dichte des Labyd, p. z8; Ibn Bashkuw§.1, p. ZOI, top; al-lusi,
Ski'a Books, p. ZI, II) [al-Sam'ani, Adab alMlmlii' wa'I·Istimla', ed. Weisweiler,
Leiden, 1952; M. Weisweiler. 'Das Amt des Mustamli', Oriens. 4 (1951), pp.
27 fl.] asks me: 'Whom have you mentioned here, may God be merciful to
you?', i.e. he wisbes to teach tradition. AI-Suyl7J.p, Ta'f'lkh. p. 104, 12. Almost
literally the same is, however, told of al·Ma'mftn, ibid., p. 131, 23·
of the affairs of those whose welfare God has entrusted to you; then
you yourself shall not be forgotten. Do not neglect what is to their [56}
welfare, so that your own welfare may not be neglected. Your share
in this world will not be lost during the nights and days through fre-
quent moving of your lips in mentioning God in tasbil;, tahti!, tal;mid
and the '1aliit for the Prophet of mercy and leader on the right path.
God in His mercy, pity and forgiveness has appointed the temporal
rulers as caliphs on earth, He has given them light with which they
may illuminate for their subjects everything that appears dark in
their daily affairs, and with which they may make clear those of
their rights which are in doubt. The illumination provided by the
mighty is the maintenance of legal ordinances (l;"dUd) and the
guarding of the rights of all through firmness and clear command.
The revival of the sunna, propagated by a pious generation, takes
highest pltWe, because reviving the sunna is one ofthose good deeds which
continue and do not perish. Unrighteousness in the shepherds means
the ruin of the flock and to demand support from others as reliable,
good (i.e. Pious) people, is the ruin of the community.' In this manner
the 'Abbiisid caliph took counsel and this spirit permeates the whole
desigu of Abii Yusuf, in which he undertakes to regulate all fields of
the public administration of the state by the sunna and does not
weary of repeating to the caliph from case to case the teaching which
he had given, as the representation of divine words, in the words
just quoted. 'Thus is it related to us from the Prophet, and I pray
to God that He may make you one of those who takes example
from his deeds (an yaj'alaka mimman istanna bi-ft'lihi)." Harlin
was not the only caliph who deemed it good to consult the theologians
about the laws of government. Passing over the evidence from the
time of the decline of the caliphate, we merely mention that al-
Muhtadi, too, asked the theologian al-Kha!!!!af (d. 261) for an opinion
about the laws of administration,' which was likewise entitled K.
1J./,-Kharaj.·
However precisely the theologians drew up the line which the
caliphs must follow in public life in order to establish the rule of
the surma, they showed themselves indulgent as regards the private
life of the ruler which, as we have seen (p. 64), did not always corres- [59}
pond to the role which the imams felt called upon to play in their
relations with the community. The court theologians took full
account of the private side of the caliph's life. They showed them-
selves learned and ingenious when it came to finding religious
culpations for life contrary to the sunna led by pleasure-seeking
rulers. The same Abu Yiisuf, who knewhow to declaim so unctuously
1 Ibid., p. 43. 12.
:I Fihrist, p. 206, r4.
:t Flfigel, Dis Krone der Lebensbescltreibungen, p. 85, note 44.
74
VOLUME TWO: CHAPTER 2
UMMAYADS AND \ABBASIDS 75
about the sunna as the only guidance for the Commander of the
Faithful, also knew how to quieten the caliph's conscience when it
came to making available to him an enjoyment forbidden by
religion. With elastic dialectics he finds soothing arguments for
Harlin al-Rashid in the same religious law tbat he used for his
text when preaching against a wicked world. It is only necessary
to read the relevant chapter in the Tuyurriyyat of al-Silafi (d. 578),
which al-Snyil!1 inccrporated into his historical compendium,'
in order to find edifying examples.
Harlin aI-RashId's father also had an obliging court theologian
who was willing to render him a service by reconciling court amuse-
ments with the sunna. The caliph al-Mahdi loved to race pigeons, a
sport strictly condemned by orthodox theological opinion. Jewish
law also forbade this amusement and declared all who indulged in '
it debarred from bearing witness and swearing oaths. The Islamic
law givers are of the same opinion.
2
The inhabitants of the sinful city
of Sodom, whom Allah obliterated from the surface of the earth
because of their misdeeds, invented this game, and he who indulges
in it 'will not die without having experienced the affliction of
poverty'.' The caliph then did not wish to act contrary to the law.
A scholar was found called Ghayath who knew how to assuage the
caliph's scruples by adjusting the law to his master's way of life.
One day this man produced the following sentence of tradition:
[70] 'Racing is allowed only with animals who have claws, hoofs,' or
wings.' This sentence was supposed to bring the condemned sport
practised by the ruler within the amusements allowed by the law.
The pious man had interpolated the words 'or wings" and for this
falsification, undertaken for the sake of quietening the orthodox
conscience of the Commander of the Faithful, he was given a
princely gift.' It is told that the caliph eventually became aware of
1 Ta'rikh, p. II4; the accounts are derived from Ibn al-Mubirak (d. 181).
Perhaps these stories were invented by the adherents of tradition out of spite
for- the ra'y lawyer Abii Yusuf.
I: It is true that-presumably in consideration of existing conditions-the
limitation was added in the third century that the ban on bearing witness v.ras
to be applied only in cases where the sport had become an obsession such that
prayers and other religious duties were neglected; Adab al-Qii.rjt, fol.
87b.
S Al.Dantin, I, p. 3-:Q, where the story is told with reference to Harfin ai-
Rashid and the theologian Abu'I.Bakhtarl.
" An Egyptian governor. Abn KhaIid Yazid b. 'Abd AIHih (middle of third
century), who was concerned with abolishing the bida', ",,-ent so far as to stop
even horse.racing and sold all horses meant for racing, Abu'l Ma1)asin. I.
p. 74'. top.
S According to Abft Dawftd, I, p. 256, the rule reads: Iii sabaka illiift khuffin
awfll;iifi-rin aw naslin=al.Tirmidhi, I, p. 317, 7, from the bottom.
, Qutb aI·Din, Ch'l'on. Mekka, p. 98.
the imposture and had all pigeons in his possession killed because
they had been the occasion for falsifications of the Prophet's words;
but the tale nevertheless shows what a court theologian was capable
of doing in matters of the tradition. Theologians who wished to
reconcile theory with the practices of life had to have recourse to
such subterfuges, and this consideration became one of the chief
factors in the history of the growlh of the l;1adlth. Racing pigeons
was not only indulged in at the prince's courl. During the third and
fourth centuries this game was widely spread in 'Iraq.' Only in the
dark times when the autocrats of the Islamic empire, having lost
their temporal power, developed into priestly obscurantists, execut-
ors of the whims of the scholastic theologians, did the caliph al-
Muqtadl (467-87) destroy all dove-cotes and forbid the sport with
pigeons.
2
The rise of the 'Abbiisid dynasty is thus the time when the move-
ment to establish the sunna as a science and as the standard of life
received official recognition. In the period of the Umayyads the ahl
a/.-'itm, the Medinians and those of the same tendency, had lived
in retirement, in their sulking corner, so to speak, and looked upon
the wicked world with inward, but ineffective, anger. Now their
appearance was favoured and they gained official influence, and their
science itself began to flourish. Let us remember how the Umayyads
treated these men (p. 41). How different the position of these people
had become under Harlin al-Rashid. It is sufficient to consider the
great honour this mighty prince heaped upon the Medinian teacher (71]
Miilik b. Anas' although he was not an unconditional follower of
the ruling house.' In the administration, too, a quite different
attitude is assumed towards the religious elements. Under the Umay-
yads, little of their influence was felt in public affairs. But from
Harlin al-Rashid we have the ,following document of investiture
for Harthama, governor of Khuriisiin: 'He (the caliph) recommends
to him (the governor) the fear of God (taqwa Allah) and obedience.
In all things concerning him, he should take the book of God as his
rule of conduct, permit what is allowed in it and forbid what is
forbidden in it. In doubtful cases he is to hold his hands and ask the
authorities on law, religion and knowledge of the book of God."
The advice of these authorities was henceforth always decisive.
The murder of al-Mutawakkil was committed on grounds of a fatwei
1 Al-Mas'Ctdi, VIII, p. 8S.
t Ibn aI-Atmr, XI, p. 85.
S Fragm. hist. arab., p. 298; cf. Dugat, Histoi-re des philosophes et des tMo·
logiens musttlmans, pp. 265 ff. [The story shows, however, a somewhat Iegencl:ary
colour; cf. El. S.v. 'Malik b. Anas'.]
" A note on this can be found in Tab., III, p. 200.
r; Ibid., p. 717. 10; Fragm. hist. arab., p. 314 6 ff.
VOLUME TWO: CHAPTER 2 UMMAYADS AND (ABBASIDS
77
which the juqahii' gave to his son and successor
Theologians now find the ground prepared to make accepted in
practice the sunna which in the Umayyad period was pushed into the
background and in part was still quite unknown. In 'Iraq, for
example, Shu'ba (d. 160) made the sunna prevail in public." His
method of finding the right sunna can be learned from the example
that, in order to find the correct form of calling to prayer (adhiin)
he consulted a pious muezzin who had his knowledge from another
pions colleague-their names are mentioned-who was able to
trace back the rules to Ibn 'Umar.' In Marw and Khurasan
4
al-
Na<;!r b. Shumayl (d. 204) was the first to make the sunna public
(a'lhara al-sunna) and likewise we learn of 'Abd Allah al-Darimi of
Samarqand (d. 255): 'He made public the sunna in his native country
and propagated it and defended it, suppressing all those who acted
contrary to it.' Such action was possible only because of the spirit
[721 which the 'Abbasids encouraged and supported in public life. From
this evidence we can also see in what a bad way Sunnite life was in
the preceding period and how late it was before what is called Islamic
law became in fact the actual norm in the public life of Muslim
society. As late as the thit'd century in Sijistan, marriages were
contracted under circumstances when according to the sunna they
were not valid at all, and only the Qa<;!1 Abu Sa'id (d.
328) succeeded in enforcing the sunna laws in this respect. 5
The public recoguition and stimulation of conduct corresponding
to the sunna both in private life and .itt public administration and
law was naturally accompanied by a freer development of the study
of the traditions of the Prophet than was possible under the Umay-
yads. At that period such research was, so to speak, only in a latent
state and was hardly in touch with everyday life. Only now was there
an investigation on a large scale of the I;aliil wa-I;arcbn, the allowed
and forbidden, of the ritual and legal ordinances. An attempt was
made to produce documents carrying the Prophet's siguature, for
all the details of the relations of religious and social life. Previously
this had not been done to such an extent. Considering that Malik b.
Anas in the middle of the second century was able to produce only
600 sayings of the Prophet relating to legal life, 6 it becomes evident
how little was done in this direction under the Umayyads. It seems
that the activities of the party of the pious were mainly concerned
1 Fragm. hist. arab., p. 561, 5.
Taltdhib, p. 315, from the bottom.
3 Abli DawCl.d, I, p. 54; I, p. 59.
4. Tab. J;luff, VI, no. 64; Talldhib, p. 594; 1:Izifj, IX, no. 5; cf. for al-Andalus,
ibid. no. I.
Ibn Khallikan, no. 157, ed. Wiistenfeld, II, p. 88.
s [ef. below, p. 202 note.]
f
I
with the cultivation and production of moral and ascetic teachings"
as well as those sayings which stood in some relation to the political
situation, their views about it, and their hope for a speedy overthrow
of the existing godless circumstances. At least it appears as if sayings
of this kind, more than legal traditions, were the ones to have pene-
trated to wider circles of the people. The evidence available for one
of the provinces of Islam seems to be largely applicable also to the
other parts of the huge empire. Amongst the Muslims who emigrated
to Egypt only, such accounts were cultivated in the first century [731
and passed on orally in the form of traditions (yatal;addathuna) as
are known under the names of maliil;im and jUan, i.e. prophetic
revelations' about revolutions and disturbances in the empire-
similar to our calendars of a hundred years and similar popular
books. The Egyptians were only concerned with such traditions
until Yazid b. Abi l:fabjb (d. 128), son of a Nubian prisoner of war;
attempted to introduce the cultivation of /;aliil wa-I;ariim and relig-
ious1aw (al-jiqh).·
VIII
Favoured from above, or at least not hampered by disregard,
studies of the law could now develop freely, and the few stones laid
by the repressed theologians of the first century in their quiet
retirement could now be expanded by steady increase to form the
edifice of Islamic legal science. This was predominantly the work of
the second and third centuries and the zeal, which managed to
produce in a century and a half what took the Romans, for example,
several centuries to develop, is worthy of admiration.
As we saw the caliph himself wished to be informed of what was
right in legal life according to religion, and the theologians of the
next generation were not remiss in providing material. In order"to
judge this activity properly one important factor must be remem-
bered.
The preparatory work of previous generations was too scanty to
afford a foundation on which to build up a system of Islamic law.
There was no fixed norm for the most elementary questions of law
1 A sort of Agada.. AI-Hajjaj asks for a mul;taddith from the mosque to come
and shorten his sleepless night with his tales, al-Mas'Odi, V, p. 312.
2 The word mall;tama (sing.) also means 'predestination, mysterious decision of
God.' To Ibn aI·'Banan.yya the saying is attributed that the martyr's death of
l:lusayn existed in the 'wise remembrance' (fi'Z·dhikY at-hakim, a notable
expression) that it was a mall;tama inflicted upon him, a gift of mercy (kaYiima)
given him by Allah, Tallo, II, p. 607, 8; cL also D. H. MCdler. Burge» und
Schlosser, I. p. 67.9:75,17.
3 Ya.ql1t, II, p. 599.
4, Abu'l.MaQ:asin, I, p. 343; al-NawawI to Muslim, p. 13I.
even within a single province of Islam. The generation of the
'successors
l
was occasionally unsure even of Koranic law
1
though
there had never been any doubt that this pillar of religious law
was untouchable. 'Abd Allah, son of Abu Hurayra, asked the son of
'Umar whether fish that had been washed ashore by the sea could
be eaten. The divine who was asked the question thought he must
answer with a firm negative. But shortly afterwards he asked for a
Koran to be brought to him and there found a passage (5:97) from
which he was forced to conclude that he had given the wrong answer
to the son of Abu Hurayra.
'
It can be imagined what uncertainty there was about qnestions
and circumstances for which no provision was made in the Koran.
At that time people were ignorant about even the most primitive
dietary laws: e.g., the most contradictory information was quoted as
to whether horse-meat was permissible or not.
2
The same uncertainty
prevailed in matters of law, e.g., rules of inheritance,' and all other
legal fields. Only the assumption that in early times the most
elementary questions of legal life were not the subject of normative
decision can explain this uncertainty and wavering in most questions
of everyday life. Without this assumption it is difficult to understand
how it was possible that during the second century various teachings
about ritual and legal problems sprang up in the several madhiihib,
and even in the same madhab, with which harmonizing theologists
could do no more than consider them as equally justified, and even
declare their very diversity to be a blessing to the Islamic commun-
ity.' Already 'Umar II, to whom religious decrees are usually attri-
buted, is said to have declined to create a general norm for the whole
Muslim community and to have sent in consequence a decree to the
outlying provinces according to which each of them was to follow
the teac!lings of the local fuqaha' .5
The Muslim theologians followed two different ways in the
formation oflegal science (jiqh).
I. The more natural, and perhaps we may also say the more honest
one, was that followed by the so·called A;;l;1iib al·Ra'y.· There were
not sufficient l;1adiths establishing legal norms handed down from
the first century to regulate all circumstances. This scanty material
had to suffice for all aspects of the fiqh. If it was desired to avoid
having recourse to new falsifications and invented traditions to fill
1 AI-MuwaUa', Il, p. 357.
S Abo. Dawud. II, p. 93.
I An interesting example is in al.Mas''D.di, V. p. 335-
4. pp. 94 ff. Add to the passages quoted there Qutb aI·Din, Chron.
Mekk., p. 210, 3ft'. The same principle is extended to dogmatic difierences,
Tab., II, p. 19, uit. (ascribed to Mu'awiya).
r. AI.Darimi, p. 79, Biib ikhtiliif al-fuqahii'.
." For more detailed references see my ahiriten, pp. 5ff.
[76]
79
UMMAYADS AND t ABBASIDS
1. Culturgesch. StreiJzuge, pp. 2-8.
: In roy Hungarian essay 'On the beginnings of Muslim legal science' (Buda.
pest. 1884, Proceedings oj the Hungarian Academy of Sciences). I have dealt
with this question at greater length, and I hope to present a new version of
that essay in another instalment of the present Studies. [This plan was not
carried out.]
3 Enger, introduction to his edition of al.Mawardi:, p. xvi, Dozy, De
contractu do ut des, pp. 17. 148; Kremer, C1tUurgesch., I, Chapter 9 passim, the
most important example p. 532; Henri Hugues, 'Les origines du droit musul·
man, 'La France 1880, pp. 252-265 (d. Dareste, Journal des savants,
1882, pp. 252-265); Van Berchem, La propriete ttrritoriale sous les pl'emiers
Califes (passim), d. Dugat Cou'Ys compUmentai'Ye de geograpkie, histoire et
ligislation des ttats mus1,lmans, Lecon d'ouverture (Paris, r873), p. 33.
... al.bayyina 'ala'l-mudda'i wa'l.yamm 'a/a'/·mudda'o, 'alayhi. B. Rahn.
no. 6; Shahadiit, nos. 19. 20; al.Tirmidhi, I, p. 251; the latter principle seems to
have been current amongst the Arabs in early times, d. the procedure in
Agh.• VIII, pp. 103£.
in all the gaps in the documentary material, the little that was
available had to be elaborated speculatively by all the methodical
means of legal deduction, which had still to be created, and, by
allowing this deductive element great authority, a legal system had
to be built up which in its positive parts showed results based not
upon the l;1adiths but upon the intellectual work of scholars. Fre-
quently legal norms were incorporated from Roman law, which
thus unintentionally extended its world-conquering power to the
Islamic peoples by this way of voluntary submission. The same social
points of connexion and contact, which Kremer has proved to be
the causes by which the dogmatic theses and problems of Oriental
Christianity entered into the intellectual life of Islam,
'
also explain
the infiltration of Byzantine legal doctrines and methods.
2
The
borrowing of such legal doctrines and legal maxims learnt from the
canonical lawyers of the conquered countries has often been stressed. 3:
General legal principles were also often borrowed and we need recall
only the supreme principle of procedure affirmanti incumbit onus
probandi, and that the oath principallydevolves upon the defendant,'
the various methods of presumption which, as is probable at least,
Muslim lawyers borrowed directly from these sources. But more
decisive is the fact that the attitude towards the legal sources and
the methods of legal deduction has been tal,en from that alien source.
The consuetudo aut rerum perpetuo similiter judicatarum auctoritas
has been transferred almost literally into the system of the Muslim
fuqahd'. The right of ra'y (opinion) also appears to be but an Arahic
translation of the opinio prudenti1<m, and the right allowed to the
fuqahii' with respect to the interpretalio juris civilis did not deveiop
WIthout the influence of Roman law. It is impossihle here to discuss
in greater detail this important question of cultural history, which
calls for a monograph. But this much can be Seen from the previous

VOLUME TWO: CHAPTER 2
7
8
[75]
[74]
1 Histoire genbale des langues semitiques, srd ed., pp. 38of.
t. AI-Dariml, p. 28=Ibn Maja p. 7. top: rna zala amy B. Isrii,'U mu'taditan
laysafihi shay'l;tatta nasha'afiMm al·nmwalZadlin abnii' sabiiya. al-umiim abna'
aZ-nisii: allati sabat B. I srii'£l mz"n ghayrz"MmJaqiilu bi'l-ya'y!a'a4aUtUmm
[ef. also aI-Khatib, Ta'1'ikh. XIII, pp. 394-5].
3 Cf. Literatu1'gesch. der SM' a, p. 69.
4 Michaud ct Poujoulat, Correspondance d'orient, 1830-31 (Brussels, 1841),
III, p. ,83.
S Zdhiriten. p. 13.
6 K. al-Khariij, pp. 36, Ioff; 39 bottom; 109, 2, etc.
7 Al-Athar MS. of the Viceregal Library. Cairo, Cat. III, p. 2 [GA L, I, p. 179,
S I, p. 23r.J
remarks-that the Muslim lawyers in Syria and Mesopotamia who
began to elaborate an Islamic legal system in the first half of the
second century did not perform a labour which (as Renan thinks)
grew out of 'Arab genius'.'
Fiqh is as little a product of the Arab spirit as are grammar
and dogmatic dialectics (kalCim), and the Muslims of early
times were fully aware that jiqh was something important. The
following saying, ascribed to 'Urwa b. al-Zubayr is characteristic as a
document of this conviction and the distaste which came as its
consequence: 'The affairs of the Banu Isra:n continued on their good
path until new elements of the nation, children of alien prisoners,
whom the Banu Isra'n captured from alien nations, arose to teach
ra'y and thus to mislead them'.' In this saying the distaste for the
non-Arab method of legal science mostly cultivated by mawiili, is
masked but not hidden. The very first and most important repre-
sentatives of this trend were of alien non-Arab extraction and the
most outstanding amongst them, Abu I:Ianifa,
3
was of Persian race.
They are the creators of what Renan considers an innate product of
the Arab spirit, or what an earlier French writer even thought to be
the product of the 'desert'. 4
2. This independent method of building an Islamic legal system is
usually connected with the name of the imam Abu I:Ianlfa (d. "SObut
he was, as has been proved elsewhere,' not its first founder but merely
theteacherinwhoseschool thismethod achievedits highest perfection.
The reaction against an untainted ra'y system sets in even amongst
his immediate pupils. Abu Yusuf has recourse to traditions against
teachings based on analogy which departed from them, and he
contradicts his teacher Abu I:Ianifa by appealing to tradition.
6
AI-Shaybani, the other great pupil of AbU Hanifa, seeks traditional
foundations for the teachings ofjiqh in Medina at the feet of Malik b.
Anas, and he endeavours in a special work' to produce the l)adith
material upon which Abu I:Ianifa's teaching is founded. He repre-
sents the right wing of the ra'y party. This tendency was more
clearly expressed by the school opposing ra'y whose followers call
themselves A.l)ab al-I:Iadith. It is younger than the ra'y school and
came into being out of opposition to the latter's methods. Its follow-
ers wished to refer back all law to the authority of the Prophet, Le.
to a proper l)adith. We have said that the path followed by them was
a less honest one, for it may readily be imagined that, in view of the
small number of 1).adiths available at the beginning of the activity of
law-making, the 1).adiths which were to be the authority for a
particular doctrine had to be fabricated or adapted. Ra'y, the law as
an independent decision, was to be rejected at all costs and even a
weakly documented 1).adlth was thought to be infinitely preferable
to it. Frequently this was, in the nature of things, merely a battle of
words, for the advocates of the 1).adith produced on the basis of a
l;1adith the same law which the advocate of ra'y established by
independent deduction. The principle however had to be preserved
even if this preservation could only be achieved by falsifications. The
only admissible authorities are those who say akhbaranii:
'the rest are no good', says A1).mad b. I:Ianbal.' From these circles
came the many derogatory judgements about Abu I:Ianifa' whichhad
to be refuted by later generations when the difference between l)adith
and ra'y had shrunk to one of merely theoretical importance.
Since there was no fixed practice for most legal questions it was
unavoidable that for one and the same question contradictory
l)adiths were invented according to the opinions of various theolog-
ians of various groups, or different 1)adiths were selected from earlier
material to be handed down. These 1)adiths were then called upon to
support the individual opinion or usage customary in a particular
circle, since the 1)adith had often only to justify existing customs.
The A.1).ab al-I;Iadith at that time did not trouble nnduly about the
authority for the sentence quoted or the complete respectability
of its informants. The strict investigation of the informants of the
isniid developed only later when the facility with which traditions
were fabricated made the tradition appear as a convenient support for
all kinds of religious and social tendencies condemned by orthodox
theologians. The form of the tradition also did not trouble them
much. Sayings which arose like the traditions of al Znhn mentioned
above (p. 47) and were circnlated as the 1)adiths of the Prophet
could be considered by them as acceptable evidence. Quly the
advocates of ra'y in 'Iraq' applied stricter criteria to the investigation
1 In Ibn BashkuwaJ., ed. Codera, p. 252.
:: The oldest collection of such judgements is in Ibn Qutayba, Mukhtalif al-
l;Iadlth, pp. 63 if.
3 This can be seen from the interesting facts which are collected in this
connection by aI.Khatib aI-Baghdadi, fols. n£[. [ed. Hyderabad pp. 26zfLJ
It is remarkable that alwBukha,rI also-as he told alKTirmidhi orally-does
not disapprove of al-Zuhri's manner of handing down the tradition (aI- 'a14) ,
al·Tinnidhi, I, p. 121, top.
[78J
81 UMMAYADS AND ABBASIDS VOLUME TWO: CHAPTER 2 80
[77]
of the origin of and the form of transmission of the tradition, because
they were able to find their way through problems of law even
without the use of directly transmitted J.>adith. The followers of the
party who were unable to get along without a J.>adith were compelled
to grasp at any text at all which could serve as proof for their theses.
It may be imagined how greatly the fabrication of J.>adiths flourished
under these circumstances.
IX
The teaching of the A.J.>ab al-!:Iadith had become a religious
postulate for the Muslim people. It folllowed from the presupposi-
tions of a believing Muslim that nothing was more self-evident than
that the law had to be based on the authority of the Book or on
other communications of the supreme legislator of the Islamic
church, i.e. the Prophet. The practitioners of ra'y had soon to
[79] adjust themselves to this demand. Since they did not want. to
sacrifice the doctrines which they had reached through speculation,
they were now driven on to a slippery path. All the positive doctrines
they taught in their schools had to be supported by J.>adiths or-
and this opened up a less dishonest way----<)xisting J.>adiths had to be
interpreted, adapted, or accommodated to their doctrine. These
are the Basran Rufan etc., hadiths which were discarded by the
Ashab al-Hadith.' Th:se hadiths intended to provide argu-
to the results of riy . In the laterra'y schools therefore
(even that bearing the name of Abu !:Ianifa) the J.>adith formally
occupies the same position as in the opposing school. The exploita-
tion of traditions in 'Iraq, however-where the ra'y schools pre-
dominated and had taken their name from this province-continued
to show that subtle character which was typical of the theology of
this school from the period when its founders had allowed more
authority to free deductions. The 'Iraqi school was put in opposition
in this respect to the !:Iijazi school which, more faithfully preserving
the old Medinian traditions, showed little talent in subtle inter-
pretations and thus did less violence to the custom? The name
1 Cf. e.g. al.Zurqani to the Jl.luwaUii:. IT. p. 7 (Ibn 'Abd aI·Ban). p. 12:
litheiy Ba$riyya JUtfiyya: a!.Shifi'l, Risiila, para. 34. wa-rawii'l.Bapiyyuna, etc.
2 It is characteristic that even a Medinian adherent of the ra'y school,
Abu Sa'id, ridicules the 'Iraqis. who reply with an epigram in which they say
that di'fJ is fostered only in 'Iraq whereas the Medinians have time only for
musicaIinstruments(al.bamm wa'l-mathna wa'].zir) (at. 'lqa, III, p. 13'2, bottom;
p. 133, 2 in place of al·zztr read al-dt1r). While in 'Iraq itself KhaIid al-Qasri
officially forbade the practice of the art of singing (Agh., II, p. 123, bottom), the
mughannun of Medina were permitted to bear witness in court, a laxity which
offended the 'Iraqis (ibid, V, p. 141, IZf!_, d. VII, p. 168, 19). The meeting of
Abu Yllsuf with the I;lijazi singer Ibn ]a-mi' affords an example of how 'Iraqi
theologians valued singers (VI, p. 70, top). The combination of singing and
82 VOLUME TWO: CHAPTER 2
UMMAYADS AND
J:Iijazi school can only be taken cum grana salis. In Medina there was
no lack of teachers of ra'y; it suffices to mention Rabi'a b. Farrukh
(d. 132, 133 or 142) because he was especially called Rabi'at al- [80]
Ra'y.' In a later chapter we shall also see that the great J:Iiiazi
teacher Malik was unable to create a law-book without opinio if
he was to avoid falsifications. He mentioned this Rabi'a as an
outstanding example, and he took over and handed down some of
his traditions.
3
He valued his method so highiy that he expressed
the judgement: 'The refinement of jiqh has ceased with Rabi'a's
death:· He remained true to J:Iiiazi tradition in valuing the sunna of
his home more highiy than the J.>adiths made up for the new doctrine.
A characteristic example in this field is the difference of opinion
regarding a form of gift called al-'umrii, i.e. a gift for life which
reverts to the donor or his heir on the death of the receiver. This
type of gift seems to be based on the ancient Arab customary law'
and was recognized as valid at Medina in Milik's time.' It is however
opposed by a number of traditional sayings which MaJik himself
knew and which declare the limiting clause of the 'umrii gift as
invalid and grant the heirs of the temporary owner the right to
consider the object of the 'umrii as their own after his death.
7
We do not intend to probe deeper into the ritual and legal differ-
ences between the various schools (maahahib). But for the under-
standing of the difference in the use of traditions in the 'Iraqi school
on the one hand and in the J:Iijazi school on the other' we will just
mention an example concerning a detail of Islamic marriage law.
When the tribe of Thaqif was subjugated-it is told-Muhammed [81]
found the first opportunity to to a decision as to what was to
1 Opponents ridiculed him and his contemporary Abl1 J:fanifa, and other
teachers of ra'y p. 16) and invented malicious anecdotes about them.
Rabi'a was described as a gossip, Bayiin, fo1. 17a [I, p. 102].
In Ibn BashkuwliI, p. 164, 10.
S E.g. al-MuwaUa', II, p. 28.
ol In al-Zurqani, III, p. 44.
6 Follows from Labid, p. 22, V. 4: wa-ma'I·miilu illa mu'mariitun waaii'i'u.
(I Al.MuwaUa', III, p. 224.
1 The opposing traditions are quoted in greatest detail by al·Nasa'r, II,
pp. 74-7. d. Ab'll Dawl1d, II, pp. 71-2.
a The points of difference behvecn the two schools were listed for the first
time by the chronicler al.Waqidi; he also treated the 'umra question, Fihrist,
P·99,10.
religious learning such as in those days (e.g. XIV, p. 45 top), and even MaI..ik
b. Anas was a singer at first and only changed his profession because his ugly
face did not promise success in that line (IV, p. 39 bottom). The answer of a
Medinian to Harlln aI·Rashid's question: 'Who in Medina condemns song?'-
'He whom God has punished with Malik b. Anas' punishment'-(II, p. 78,
q) refers to tbis.
[82]
VOLUME TWO: CHAPTER 2
be done with the wives of newly converted pagans who were married
to more than four wives, because Ghaylan, who had been converted
to Islam, had ten wives. The Prophet ordered him to 'keep four of
these women and to part with the others'.' This decision became tbe
hadith source for all similar cases.' But Muhammed's decision is
differently interpreted by the two schools. The !pjazis, taking the
authoritative sentence literally, say that it makes no difference
which of the women are dismissed' as the Prophet only asks that
four women be retained, the others dismissed. The 'Iraqis investigat-
ing, and having regard to the ratio of the law, stress that from an
Islamic point of view only the oldest four wives are legal spouses
since marriage with the later ones was forbidden by Islam. If, then,
a pagan living in such illicit marriage dissolves the unions, he may
keep four wives in the order of their seniority, and the younger
wives whom he married as fifth, sixth etc., he must dismiss as being
illegitimate. •
This shows the influence of the speculative element upon the
method of 'Iraqi interpretation; and even this sophistry, by which
they sought to adapt an acknowledged tradition to their inde-
pendent doctrine, was distasteful to their opponents. When the
Medinian 'Ubayd Allah b. 'Umar, a great-grandson of the caliph
'Umar I, came to 'Iraq in the second half of the second century, he
felt called upon to accuse the religious leaders of that country of
corrupting and obscuring religious knowledge.
5
Malik b. Anas did
not believe that any of his 'Iraqian contemporaries. with the single
exception of Hushayrn b. Bashir from Wiisit (d. I83), could handle
the J:1adith properly.' For this dislike of 'Iraqi method its enemies
invented pretexts from early Islamic history. An 'Iraqi of the period
of 'Umar I, b. 'lsi, is said to have travelled amongst the
armies of the true believers garrisoned in the various conquered
provinces, in order to explain dubious points of the Koran; but when
he also came to Medina he was soundly whipped by 'Umar, and
everyone was warned not to have dealings with him.' Traditionists
1 AI.Shaybani, p. ':240.
'1 From the traditions in Abn. Dawl1d, I, p. 222, this is even more obvious:
the Prophet is made to say there: ikhtar minka arba' an.
"Cf. Ibn I:;lajar, IV, p. 690. From Ibn Jurayj: 'Islam came and Abfi Sufyan
b. Barb had six wives; b, Umayya also had six wives (giving their
names) , .. He then divorced Umm Wahab who was already old; from Fiikhita
bint al.Aswad he was separated by the law of Islam beca.use she was formerly
his father's wife; under 'Umar's reign he also parted from' Atika (not because
of the law but voluntarily).' (Umm Wahab and Fakhita are in the first and
second places in the list of wives.)
4 In al-Suhayll to Ibn Hisham, Dotes. p. 199·
• TahdMb, p. 403, 3·
G Ibid, p. 608, 7.
1 Yaqnt, III, p. 677, 19·
j
1
I
I
1
L
UMMAYADS AND 'ABBASIDS 85
recount punishment with great glee,' and anecdotes were
told of his subtleties which were designed to ridicule this whole trend
of religious scholarship.'
But not only in specific questions of the application of the law
do the two schools follow different ways. Occasionally this difference
extends to much more general legal questions. To give but one
example we will just mention that, according to the I:Iijazl school,
judgement should never be given on the basis of subjective presump-
tions or the personal conviction of the judge (bi-'ilmihi); the judge
must always base his sentence on objective proofs, and if those are
lacking' judgement must be suspended despite the moral conviction
of the judge.' The 'Iraqi school' was more inclined to favour the
admissibility of the subjective conviction of the judge.' In this
general question also we see that the theologians do not withold
recognition of the value and justification of subjective intuition.
x
From the preceding it can be seen that, even in the earliest times
of its development, it is impossi1;Jle to speak of a uniform sunna in
Islam, since different contradictory J:1adiths concerning one and
the same question, which arose in order to support the conflicting
opinions of the various schools, are juxtaposed as having equal
authority. Theoretically there were several methods of reconciling
such contradictory sayings. The consolidation of the study of
tradition produced the criticism of the l;ladiths and their authorities,
whereby it became possible to give more credence (tarjil;) to the
authorities for one J:1adith than to those for another. Thus one ob-
tained a reason for preferring one tradition to another, which in-
volved a conflicting doctrine.
The adjustment of differences which arrived at eliminating the
existence of a contradiction by a process of hannonization, seems
to be an earlier method. This harmonization was practised very
early on, because opponents of the J:1adith as a whole liked to attack
1 In greatest detail in al.Darimf, p. 3I.
2 Ibn Durayd, p. 139, bottom.
S This recalls the Talmudic legal rule: en la-ddayyaii ella ma she'enawro'olh,
Bathra, fol. 131 a (correct the reference in Levy, Neuhebr. W6rterbuth. I, p.
399a, and KobutArukh, III, p, 93b, bottom).
... But concessions or principles were possible also within this teaching -oy
using the principle about which see WZKM, I, p. 229·
G But within this there were also differences of opinion, as is explained in
detail in Adab al-Qti4i. £ols. 95 ff. in aI.Zurqani, III.
p. 181 declaims against those lawyers who defend the principle and hold that
'the witness that dwells within a man is more trustworthy than an outside
witness.'
, B. A1)kiZm, no. '21.
[83]
86
VOLUME TWO: CHAPTER 2 UMMAYADS AND 'ABBASIDS
this contradictory character of the different traditions in order to
prove that the authority attributed in pious circles to such 'tradi-
tions' was unjustified. The followers of the !)adith had to be pre-
pared for such attacks. The easiest line of defence was to get rid of
such contradictions by attempts at harmonization. AI-Shafi'i (d.
20
4), who of all the early teachers has earned the greatest credit for
the creation of a methodology in legal science, has dedicated many
chapters to this in his Risala (a treatise on u§ul al-jiqh, the principles
of legal science),' and he developed the theory according to the
principles of which contradictory !)adiths can be made to agree.
Ibn Qutayba already handles these weapons of defence with great
ease, which indicates that this method was already well established
in the circles to which he belongs. An example will best illustrate this
[84J methodical trick: 'They (the opponents of tradition) say two con-
flicting !)adilhs about the (young) children of unbelievers. You relate
that sa'b b. ] atthama said to the Prophet: "During a raid in the
darkness of the night our horses trample the children of the un-
believers." The Prophet then said: "They (the children) belong to
their fathers."'-And then you relate that the Prophet sent a
detachment of troops who killed the women and young children,
which the Prophet disapproved of very strongly. They said: "These
are the offspring of unbelievers." But he replied: "Are not your best
the offspring of unbelievers?I"3 .
'We say of this that there is no difference between the two tradi-
tions. Sa'b b. ]atthama stated that the horses "during a raid in the
darkness of the night ..." etc. To this the Prophet replied that the
children belong to their fathers, i.e. in this world they must be
judged similarly to their fathers. It was a dark night, a raid was
made on the unbelievers; you ought not to withdraw because of
young children, since they get the same as their fathers. One ought
not, however, to intend the killing of the children.'
'What he disapproved of in the other tradition is that they have
killed women and children intentionally (ta' ammadu dhalika) because
of the unbelief of their fathers. About this he said: "Are not your
1 This work, which is important for the history of the interpretation ?f the
J?adith, is the point of departure of Islamic legal science; the Viceregal Llbrary
at Cairo possesses two manuscript copies of it [ed. A. Sha.kir. Cairo, I94
o
).
2: Abl1 Dawiid, I, p. 264.
:s The Prophet selected those of the prisoners of the B. who had
beards and these he had killed; the others were spared, according to • al·
Qura;d who owed his life to this fact, Takdhf.b, p. 425, 7; accordingly the
unintelligible thmm ythbtil in TahdMb. p. 522, 4. must be corrected to lam
yu»bitu. In Abii Dawild, I, p. 259, top, I, pp. 298, 300 the instruc-
tions ascribed to the Prophet about wars with unbelievers are given. To spare
children, women and old people is unconditionally recommended. Cf. FYagm.
hist. arab., p. 75, I, Tab.,I, p. 1850.
I
best offspring of unbelievers?", I.e. perhaps there are some amongst
them who would make honest Muslims when they reach maturity."
There are few chapters of Islamic law the tradition material of
which is free of such contradictions. It is obvious that in fact, in
the actual practice of daily life, tradition prevailed which was
based on a recognition of the existing state of affairs and which
gave it legal authority·, which became an element of discipline in the [85J
uncertainty and 'Wavering of the chaotic circumstances of early
times, or which regulated in an un-contradictory manner a new
aspect of life which had only arisen through Islam. It would be
illusory to think that a !)adith running altogether contrary to
prevailing usage would succeed in actually upsetting the existing
circumstances, even taking into account the protection granted to
those busy with its study.
The increasing importance of the sunna under the 'Abbasids was
not enough to make all and sundry the prey of the men of the sunna.
At first their activity appears to have been kept at the level of the
demands of everyday life, which they endeavoured to regulate in a
religious spirit. Life, however, could not be adapted to all the
extravagances which their study might produce. It was impossible
to abolish deep-rooted legal practices and other habits which were
not to their taste and did not correspond to the consequences of their
theological presuppositions. Again and again the problem arose
that practice did not always agree with the sunna. If only local
deviations were concerned the theologians could declaim against
them and could vent their anger against the rulers who did not aid
themsufficientlyin taghYir al-munkar. 3 Occasionally they found agod-
fearing governorwhohoped to obtain Allah's grace insupportingthem.
Frequently, however, more than local deviations were at stake.
Amongst the teachings of pious traditionalists there were some whIch
were in contrast to the practice followed in wide fields of public life.
They did not, however, possess the power-though they were rather
inclined to claim it-to remodel trends to conform with their
fictions. It was impossible to achieve this with customs and ideas
which were of more than local importance and so deeply rooted in
practice that they had justlyto be considered as ijma-, 'the consensus
of the whole community'. The theologian then had to come to terins.
He either conceded that his !)adith was abrogated by another text
(mansukh)-it was easy to find an abrogatory text (nasikh) in the
welter of contradictory !)adiths in circulation-or the ultimate con- [86J
cession which could be expected of him had to be made, I.e. he had to
1 MukhtaUfal-l;iadith, p. 315.
S As e.g. in Medina-according to p. 8s-those l}adlths gained ascendancy
which sanctioned the customary right of the 'umra gift.
S Cf. ZDMG, XLI, pp. 56f!.
88 VOLUME TWO: CHAPTER 2
admit that, although the ijmii' contradicts the clear expression of the
sunna, it does not abolish the wording of the law, since the ijmii' is
unable to abrogate the sunna, just as it cannot itself be abrogated;
but its contradiction of the sunnaserves as proof that somewhere there
must exist an abrogatory sunna (on which the ijmii' is based) even
if this cannot be documented." This is a rabulistic trick intended to
rescue the sunna's authority in the face of the powerful claims of
the realities of life. In earlier times,2 however, people were more
sincere. They did not presuppose the existence of unknown l).adiths
which could be used to justify everyday usage as being in accordance
with the sunna; instead it was admitted freely-for instance by
Ibn Qutayba, one of the most zealous advocates of the A.J:1ab
al-l;!adith against the teachers of the ra'y, in the third century-
that 'the truth was more likely to be contained in the ijmii' than in
tradition. The J:1adith is subject to many vicissitudes, due to the
negligence of those handing it down, confused explanations, the
abrogations which may have occurred, the unreliability of infor-
mants, the existence of two contradictory J:1adiths.... The ijmii' of
the community is £Ice from such vicissitudes.... This is the reason
why people hand down J:1adlths going back to the Prophet but follow
in practice other ways. '3
This contradiction brought to maturity the doctrine about the
weight of the general opinion and general practice of the Muslim
community (this is ijmii'), and this great principle weighed more in
Muslim conscience than any other argument. 'My community
reaches no agreement that is an error: Muhammed is said to have
declared.' Only a few theologians have stood out against the un-
[87] conditional validity of the ijmit.' The ijmii' is thus a counterweight
to the attempt of traditionists to reform existing customs accordingto
their own views and to oppose sharply the customary laws of society.
As we have just seen, they had to admit their weakness in the face
of such power and they were clever enough to find a form for this ad-
mission which made the recognition of ijmii' an element of the sunna.
1 Al.Nawav"i, I, p. 22, I].
Malik b. Anas decides in favour of the correctness of praxis rather than
con:fl.icting l].adiths; this is to him on a par with ijma'; d. the discussion of this
question in aVAbdari, Madkhal, I, p. 292.
3 Mukhtalij al·I:IadUh, p. 3u. Examples, ibid., p. lI2.
, Abu DawOd, II, p. 131, bottom; al·Tirmidhi, II, p. 25: I,
1). 14; p. 33, note 2. The ijma' tradition is not mentioned by B. and
Muslim; it did not count as (of undoubted correctness) but only as
!i Especially in philosophical circles, e.g. the Mu'tazilite al-NaHam. The
follo'wing train of thought is atb"ibuted to him: 'It is possible that all Muslims
admit an erroneous teaching; the whole of Islam, for example, teaches un-
animously that in contrast to other prophets Muhammed had a mission to
the whole of mankind. The fact is, however, that God sent every prophet to all
mankind' etc., Mukhtalif aZ.I:IadUh, p. 19_
CHAPTER THREE [881
THE BADITH IN ITS RELATION
TO THE CONFLICTS OF THE
PARTIES IN ISLAM
I
FOR cnltural histOlY the legal parts of the J:1adith are of lesser
importance than those which show how the religious elements of the
Muslim world came to grips 'With political circumstances and
relations in Islam. Like all their teachings, opinions on these matters
are given in the form of the J:1adith. In this connection we shall have
to consider some groups of J:1adiths which will illuminate the relation-
ships which grew from the attitude of religiously orientated circles
to the actual powers of the state.
First of all our attention will be devoted to a group of political
J:1adiths which owe their origin to the intention of securing obedience
to the government under circumstances in which it might have
appeared a religtous duty just for the religiously minded to refuse
obedience. Such circumstances were first brought about by the
Umayyad regime, which was completely opposed to religion. It
conld not appear as self-evident to a pious Muslim that he shonld
submit to it in the same way as the Syrians, who have been charac-
terized as <the most eager to show obedience towards men and the
most reluctant to show obedience towards God';l and even if a
Muslim faithful to religion had not been led by his own feelings to
doubt whether the rulers at Damascus and their devoted generals
and governors, such as al-:£:Iajj1i.j b. Yiisuf, Kh1i.lid al·Qasri and
si.miIar men, were the rightful leaders of the religious community,
enough pretenders and revolutionaries could be found, whose
emissaries did not omit to put a pietistic veil round their in [89]
order to be more effective.
The problem throughout of how true believers were to behave
under such rulers appeared in this period as one of the most im-
portant questions in religious life. It was solved in various ways
and the tradition has preserved a reflection of these decisions. We
1 In Abfi'I-Ma1:lasin, I, p. 80, 10.
-. -*-
a
90 VOLUME TWO: CHAPTER 3
have already shown in the previous chapter that there were intran-
sigents who did not acknowledge at all these wicked rulers and
their organs, to whom they gave the name mubillun, the profanity-
doers' and met them with passive resistance. These people shared
entirely the point of view of the Khiirijites in regarding it a duty to
fight such rulers, but they were divorced from them by their con-
viction about the justification of the caliphate of 'Ali and possibly
of his successors. They completed, even at the hour of their death,
their belief in God and in Muhammedls mission with the confession
that al-l:!ajjaj cannot be reckoned amongst the believers." The more
patient and the milder among them circulated !)adiths like the follow-
ing: 'You will eventually be ruled by emirs, who will dispose of your
daily bread and will refuse it unless you admit their lies to be true
and support them in their unbelief: give unto them what is theirs by
law as long as they accept the same from you, but if they act as
traitors in this, fight them and he who is killed because of such
conduct will be deemed a martyr.13
This opposition party contrasted sharply with a completely
loyal trend, whose adherents were apparently called Mnrji'ites'
because they did not consider the virtual rejection of religious laws
by the Umayyads as sufficient reason to refuse obedience even
theoreticallya or to brand them as kcifirin
6
and declare them as
damned, and because in order to acknowledge the Umayyads as
[90] true believers it was snfficient in their eyes that they professed
Islam in general; they did not ask too many questions about actual
behaviour.' Thus these people did not object to the cruel measures
1 Agh., VI, p. SI, 15. mttl:ill about al-!;Iajjaj. ef. Agh., XV, p. 8, Yaqilt II,
p. 429. 3 from the bottom. This is of course a one·sided subjective opinion:
the Umayyads in their turn call the pious Zubayrids in Mecca al.niikithun,
Agh., XXI, p. '46, 5,
S AI-:Mas'iid'i, V, p. 377, 6.
3 In Ibn I;Iajar, IV, p. 167_
4 [For the l\:Iurji'a see also Goldh..izer, Vorlesungen uber den Islam (Heidel-
bt'rg. 1910), index, s...... 'Murdschia'; G. van Vloten. 'Irdscha'.ZDMG.XLV,pp.
165fT.; A. J. \Vcnsinck's article 'al-Murj'ia' in EI.]
Ii In later times this difference of attitude became the theoretical scholastic
problem of ima111at al-jiis£q. i.e, whether a sinner may be the head of the
Muslim community. Abu J;Ianifa. as a Murji'. is said to have answered this
affirmatively, but some of the followers of his school deny this;
Adab al-Qar/!, fol. :26b.
e The mild judgements about the Syrian opponents of 'AlI collected in
al· 'lqd, II, p. 283, come from these moderate circles.
1 In a report of Ibn Jarir (al·Tabari) the view that SllIa I8:IIO (fa-man
kana yarju liqij'a rabbihi ja'l-ya'mal 'amalan was the last revelation
of the Koran (not liable to abrogation) is ascribed (probably after an earlier
source) to the caliph Mu'awiya r, without the indication of a special reason for
this attribution: al.Suyi'ttI, Itqan, r, p. 34 [from al-Tabari's commentary on the
passage, XVI, p. 28.] It can be surmised that it is not without intention
!
THE IifADITH ITS RELATION TO PARTIES IN ISLAM 91
of the Umayyads and their governors against those pious men who
refused them their allegiance, and they defended the massacre which
the Urnayyads caused amongst their pietist adversaries. Even pious
doctors of the law belonged to the Murji'ite party'-no doubt those
theologians whom we have already met as willing tools and lenient
judges of the Umayyad trend. They were expected bythe authorities
to declare the opponents of the dynasty and their abettors as
'unbelievers' and to spread this doctrine with the motivation that
'those who split the staff,
2
break the oath of allegiance, leave the
community and thus threaten the security of the Muslims are worthy
of the name of kiifir'. S Without such help it would hardly have been
possible for the Umayyads to gain a foothold in Islam. We have
sure evidence from 'Awn b. 'Abd Allah b. 'Utba b. Mas'lid, a.pious
theologian (end of the first century), that he sided with these Murji'-
ites at first. Later he left them in order to fight in the rebel army of
al-Ash'ath against al-l:!ajjaj and only under 'Umar b. 'AM al-
'Aziz did he become reconciled to the Umayyads,' because this
prince himself adhered to the principle: that the man who opposes
an unjust ruler is not a rebel but the unjust ruler is one, since there
is no obedience which is practised by disobedience to God.' 'Awn
was also a poet and a little poetic document exists regarding his
separation from the loyal Murji'ites, which shows what the Murji'ites
tanght about relationships with the Umayyads:
'The first from which I unquestionably separate myself-I [91
renounce what the Murji'iin confess:
They say the blood of believers may be shed,' whereas their
blood must be spared;
They say a believer may belong to the unjust (ahl' al-jawr),
whereas the unjust (al-jii'irun) are no believers.'
1 E.g. Ibn Qutayba, ed. Wiistenfeld, p. 24°,3.
:I Cf. al-Maydanl lIP. 57, bottom, to the proverb: iyyijka wa.qiUil a1- 'asCi;
for the expression, Agh., XIII, pp. 52, 8 from the bottom, 59, 18.
:I Al-'Iqd, III, p. :25, top.
ol Cf. Fragm. kist. arab.. pp. 42f.
S AJ-Mas''O.dl, V, p. 422, r.
1I One should only remembertbe words of Ziyad b. Abihi to IJasan: 'I love to
eat meat (to kill people) of which you are made,' aZ·'Iqd, III, p, 5. 3 from the
bottom.
'I Vax. aI; this reading would give even better reason to relate to the Umayyad
family.
8 Ibn Qutayba, p. I29=Agh., VIII. pp. 9:2, ISH; cf. Kremer, Culturgesch.
Streijziige, p. 5. note 2.
that the opponents of the Murji'ites attribute the refutation of that party just
to the Umayyads. The hamzated root from which the name of the party is
derived is often confused with the root rjw (to hope).
92 VOLUME TWO: CHAPTER 3
It is highly probable that the origin of the Murji'ite party is to
be sought in such loyal accommodation with the Umayyad rule.
When later this cause disappeared and the justification of 'shedding
the blood of true believers, had lost all reality, the Murji'ites con-
centrated their attention upon the dogmatic evaluation of the
practice of law ('amal) on salvation. Thus we should have to pos-
tulate, as the historical antecedent of this dogmatic Murji'a, a
political Murji'a. This, however, throws no more light upon the
linguistic obscurity concerning the literal meaning of thls party's
name.
l
Since the politico-religious opponents of the Umayyad>, in so far
as they were not Kharijites, mainly adopted the party of the' AJids,
the Murji'a was a natural contrast to the ShI'a and the actual
existence of such opposition may serve as proof of the correctness of
our view.' In a poem of the Kaysanite poet al-Sayyid al-:E;lirnyarl
(d. ca. I73--<.J) which praises the two sons of 'Ali, the poet calls to his
opponents: khalilayya Iii turji'ii wa'lamii/bi'-anna'l-huaii ghayra
mii taz'umiini ('My friends, do not commit irjii' and know that the
right guidance is not this which you believe').'
[92] Irjii' (nomen verbi of the same root from which murji' is nomen
agentis) here means the rejection of the 'Alid imams and recognition
of their opponents. In effect, in the continuation of this poem (v.
IO), the recognition of the Umayyads (Ibn Barb, wa-ashyii'ihi) is
described by the verb yurji'. The poet uses this word, however, in
an extended, perhaps ironical, meaning in reference to his own
imam: 'My irjii' concerning Abii Basan ('Ali)' is the right (irjii')
turning away from the two 'Umars (Abii Bakr and 'Umar), whether
they are jllst or damned'
5
The Murji'ites thus form the Joyal opposition party to the 'Moun-
tain', those unbending religious opponents of the Umayyads and in
the course of history also of other rulers who acted against the
religious law, for the disgust of the pious with the life lived at the
centre of government did not die with the disappearance of the
Umayyads. Between these two extreme trends there is a middle
1 C£' Houtsma, De strijd over net dogma [In den Islam tot op eZ.Ash'ari,
Leideo, 1875], p. 34.
Z Ibn Qutayba. p. 230, 15: ithnani yatashayya'iini wa-thnani murji'ani
wa-thnani yarayani ra'ya-t-khawarij; Agh., IV, p. 63, penult: ikhta§ama SM'E
wa-Mttrji'. 'Whereby not the political but the dogmatic Murji' was meant,
the Murji' is opposed with wa'fdi; al-Tiisi, SM'a Books, p. 376, no. 850, d.
ibid., p. 368, no. 808; yaquI bi'I-irghii'; contrast: yadkhab iUi'l-wa'fd.
3 Agh., VII, p. 16, 12. (My friend Snouck drew my attention to this passage.)
4 It must be noted that in this sense also the first conjugation of rjw (tcrtiae
w) is used, e.g. in the same poem v.l: arju Aba Jiasanin 'AIiyyan; cf. al.'Iqd,
III, p. 2"2, II, in a pro-Umayyad sense: inn! la-'arja ti't-Haj}aj; cf. above
p. 90 note 7.
6 Agh., VII, p. II, 12; cf. ibid, I, 16: fa-laysa 'aIayya fi' -l·irjli'i ba/sun.
.,
THE :E;.IADITH ITS RELATION TO PARTIES IN ISLAM 93
party, which succeeded in penetrating the collective consciousness of
Islam and whose outlook has also left the most traces in the hadfth,
These mediating theologians-for it is of them we speak-achieved
a very clever feat. As the unworthiness of the rulers from the point
of view of religion could not be denied, despite the tolerance of the
Murji'a, these theologians spread the doctrine that obedience was
in all circumstances due to the ae facto rulers in the interest of the
state and the unity of Islam from those who were convinced that
personally they were unworthy. By spreading J:>adfths inculcatiug
this teaching these people unintentionally performed an invaluable
service to the ruling circles; and it seems that they thereby greatly
helped to ensure that each ruler was quietly accepted by the pop-
ulace, which tolerated and paid homage to the unworthy regime,
while also accepting as accomplished fact every revolution which
managed to legitimatize itself by success. It was merely necessary
to calm the religious conscience' incited by pietistic demagogues,
rebels and pretenders; and if this was done the people at large did
not care much whether Zayd or 'Amr sat on the throne of the
caliphate-'Come with Ramla or Hind, we shall pay them homage as
Commanders of the Faithful.' What can it matter to us which king [931
exerts his power about us/"
For the earlier' as well as all later times the words of the poet
'Amr b. 'Abd al-Malik al-'ItrI, contemporary of the rivalry between
the two 'Abbasid princes AmIn and Ma'miin, characterize public
feeling: 'We will not leave Baghdad, even if this or the other departs
or stays; if only we can live comfortably we are not concerned
whether this or the other is imam.'4
II
Religious scruples were removed by the pious theologians with
their J:>adfths. We will now concern ourselves with this layer of
calming J:>adfths which had such an important influence upon the
development of Islamic state life. The reader will be able to observe
that the J:>adfths represent different grades of mediation' which it
l
does not seem necessary to keep apart here. All of them have the
same purpose: to teach that even a wicked government must be
obeyed and that it must be left to God to cause the downfall of
1 Al-Mas'ild.i. V. p, 71. 6.
I Ibid p. 174, penult.
3 Cf. Kremer, Herrschenden Ideen, p. 356, bottom.
4. Al-Tabari, III, p. 8go.
S The oppositional teaching is still mirrored in the following J;!.adith: 'The

was your cousin Mu'a.wiya orders us to do, must we obey
him? Obey hlm, sald the Prophet. in obedience to God, refuse him in resis-
tance to God: Abl1. Dawild, II, p. 131.
94 VOLUME TWO: CHAPTER 3
rulers of whom He disapproves. Abu Yusuf already has collected the
doctrines belonging into this category in his epistle to Harun al-
Rashid' and in al-Shaybani's work on the law of war is another
collection of them.
2
'He who disapproves of some of his ruler's
actions may bear this in patience, for he who leaves obedience by
even a span will die like a pagan.'2 'It is better to have a tyrannical
government for a time than to have a period of revolution." 'He who
[94\ leaves the community by the distance of but one span, has cast
away the rope of Islam (sign of submission).' 'Hell has seven gates;
l
one of them is destined for those who draw the sword upon my
community (ummali)" 'One day many, very many, evils will arise
lin my community; but he who undertakes to split the common
cause of the Muslims is to be killed with the sword, whoever he may
be.' 'How will you behave'-the Prophet is made to ask-'when
rulers succeeding me wilt take for themselves part of the booty
(i.e. squander the state treasury)?' 'Then', is the answer, 'we shall
take the sword upon our shoulder' and fight (against the ruler)
until we meet you again.' The Prophet replies: 'But I will show you
what is better than that: be patient until you meet me agahl.'
'Every emir is to be followed into war whether he be just or not
(barran kana aw jiijiran), and the ,aliit must be performed behind
any Muslim, be he just Or wicked'.' 'Obey your superiors and resist
not, for to obey them is to obey God, to rebel against them is to
rebel against God.... If someone manages your affairs and acts
against God's will, may he be cursed by God (i.e. God will know how
to punish him but you must not refuse obedience}."" The Prophet's
saying: man ahana sul!iina'llahi ji'l-ar# ahanah,,'lliihu (He who
despises God's government on earth, him God will humble)" is
quoted to those who disapprove. 'Do not insult the regents, because
of actions of the representatives of the government which are
against the sunna. If they are acting well they deserve God's reward
and you must be grateful; if they act badly the sin rests with them
and yon must be patient; they are the whip with whom God punishes
those he wishes to punish. Do not receive the scourge of God with
1 K. al-Kharaj, pp. s:ff.
, WJL, XL, pp. 58ff. [I, pp. ,o6ff.]
a B. Fitan, no. 2.
, Malik b. Anas in al.Maqqari, I, p. 900, 4. suI/an ja:ir muddatan khayr min
fitnati sa'a. A similar saying is given as motto of b. al. 'A!j: sul#an lalum
ghashum khayr tninfitna taaum, al.Ya'qllbI, II, p. 263, 14- (In al.Maydani, I.
p. 3I 3. ult., mentioned as muwallad).
II AI.Tirmidhi, II, p. 191, 15.
I Cf. B. ]izya no. 18: waij,a,'na 'ala 'awatiqina.
7 Abn. Dawlld, I, p. 252; II. p. 183; cf. B. Jizya. no. 4·
B Ibn l:lajar, IV, p. 319.
D AI-Tirmidhl. II, p. 35.
THE J>ADITH ITS RELATION TO PARTIES IN ISLAM 95
anger and annoyance but receive it with humility and subjection."
From snch considerations the representatives of this view reject
the murder of tyrants: 'AJ-I;Iajjaj is a punishment sent by God;
do not meet God's punishment the sword. '2
Generally, true believers are exhorted not to join any party in [95]
times of political rebellions and revolutions (fiian), but to remain
quietly at home and to await the end in submission and with
patience (,abr). 'The seated one" is better than he who stands, the
standing better than he who walks, the walker better than he who
strives." 'Be stay-at-home' (kunu a/llilsa
5
b"yutikum). 'Blessed is he
who avoids public agitations (inna'l-sa'id la-man jilnaba'l-fitan),6
and if against one's will one is forced by the rebels to show one's
views, it is better to be 'Abd Allah the killed than 'Abd Allah the
killer." At the time of thejitna one should 'break one's bow, tear the
'take up a wooden sword'.8 etc.,s but best of all one should
hide in the furthest and least comfortable comer from such revolu-
tions" in order not to be involved in the movement. To this group
belong those traditions which exhort the believers and comfort
them by saying that if it is not possible to alter prevailing evil
with hand and tongne, it is sufficient to protest with the heart."
'He who is an eyewitness and disapproves will be considered as if he
had not seen it' (man shahiilaha wa-karihahii ka-man ghiiba 'anhii}.12
These were general principles given to the people by the theo-
logians in order to support the existing order and to prevent civil
troubles. They also endeavoured to find practical examples from the
ancient history of Islamfor their general theoretical teachings. These [96]
examples were meant to showthat pious Muslims of patriarchal times
1 In al.FakhrJ. ed. Ahlwardt, p. 40.
! Al·'Iqd, III, p. 22. bottom.
a Cf. the speech of Abn. Musa al·Ash'ari to the people of Kufa, AbU I;!an.
Din., p. 154. 5. where it says, 'The one (al·nii'im) is better than the
standing.' For this use of nama in earlier language see Dozy. SttppUm[ent
aux dictionnaires arabes. Leiden, r88r], p. 790a; cf. Oesterr. Monatsschr. fUr
den Qrie1.t, XlI (1885), coL 2oga: qa'im wa·mi'im, Yaqut, IV, p. 594, r3.
'AI.Tirmidbi, II, p. 31.
II Also (oilsa baytika in the singular; for the explanation see scholias to
Abu'l-'Ala', Saq# al-Zand, II, p. ISO, V. I; cf. bits min aillas baytt'hi, Abu
Hanifa Dinaw, p. 234, 19.
II AbO. Dawud, II, p. 133.
7 Ibn Qutayba, Mukhtalif al-lJadUh, p. 182.
B It seems obvious to think of a connection with the fact discussed by van
Gelder, Mocktar de vaalscke pyoJeet (Leiden, 1888). p. 72.
g Al-Tirmidhi, II, p. 32.
10 B. Iman no. 10, p. IZ, bottom. By this ftrar min al-fttan, therefore, is not
meant escape from moral temptation (Krehl, Beitrage zur Charakteristik deY
LehYe vom Glauben im Islam. Leipzig, 1877. p. 36) but the avoidance of insub·
ordination against authority.
11 ZDMG, XLI. p. 57. note I. III Abu Dawo.d, II, p. 142.
D
1 B. Diyiit no. 2 = Fitan, no. IO.
2 B. TafsiY. no. I4; d. no. r03. end, to Sura 8:33.
:I See Part I p. 23; add to the reference a note 2; B. Jizya, no. 22, Abo.
Daw'CLd, I, p. 275, al.DarimI, p. 338. The account of the flag hoisting in the
Jahiliyya seems to originate with a poetical figure of speech. Cf. wa-yurfa'
lakum jI kuUi majma'atin liwa'u, Zuhayr r:63 (ed. Landberg, p. 165, v. 4);
idltii mii riiyattm t'ufi' at li·majdin, al.Shammakh, Agh., VIII, p. 106, 21 =
Tahdib, p. 148, penult.
4 The lectio vulgata is 'udhran, but the variant ghadran is preferable.
5 B. Fitan, no. 22. Parallel passages to the traditions quoted here are in
Muslim, IV, pp, 280-8.
G Latcr orthodox theology also took the theoretical consequences of this
teaching. The question whether Yazid may be abused is seriously considered
and decided according to the interdiction of the 'abuse of the Companions'
(sabb ai.saMlaba; d. Literaturgesck. der SM'a, pp. 19-20); see in detail al·
Damiri,II, p. 266; al.QastalHini, V, pp. II7!., X, p. 193. In the fifth century a
I:Ianbalite tbeologian, 'Abd al.Mugbith b. Zuhayr aI-1:1am (d. 483), goes so
far as to publish a book Fi Faq.a'il ¥azfd (on Yazid's excellencies) which brings
him heated polemics from Ibn al- JawzI (Ibn al·Athir XI, p. 230). [For the
attitude towards Yazid cf. Goldhizer in ZDMG LUI (1899), p. 646, LXIV
('9'2), pp. '39-43: Lammens, Yaz'. I", pp. VI (19'3), 48ofl.]
had rejected political life and its disorders from this pacific point of
(
view. AI-Al.>naf b. Qays reports: I set forth in order to help 'this man'
(i.e. 'Ali before the battle of the camel) I met Abu Bakra and he
I said: 'Where are you going?' 'I want to go and help this man.'
I 'Turn back,' countered Abu Bakra, and I heard the Prophet say:
,. 'If two Muslims draw swords against one other, both, the murderer
and the murdered, will go to hell." When Nafi', a client of Ibn 'Umar'
who did not wish to participate in the revolt of Ibn al-Zubayr, was
asked about his negative behaviour towards the revolt against the
evil government in Syria, he is made to reply: 'It is said in the Koran
(2:I89) "Fight them (the unbelievers) so that there may be no
rebellion and so that there may be submission to God". We have
fought to end revolt and to lead God's din to victory. Your war
leads to revolt and to a state where din does not belong to God.'2
The following account, which is also referred to Nafi', is clearer
than all the other religious accounts on this subject. When the
Medinians declared the Umayyad Yazld b. Mu'awiya deprived of
the caliphate, 'Umar's son (whose client was Nafi') gathered to-
gether his intimate companions and his children and addressed them:
'I have heard the Prophet say that on the day of resurrection a flag
will be hoisted before all who have broken faith.' We have paid
homage to this man (Yazld) by God and by His apostle. I know of
no greater perfidy' than to pay homage to a man by God and His
apostle and then to go and lift the sword against him." This story is
meant to teach the believers of all times that the dnty of a subject's
submission must not be refused, even to the most evil of all possible
[97] rulers.
6
This was meant as a lesson to those who saw a virtue in
9
6 VOLUME TWO: CHAPTER 3 THE J!:ADITH ITS RELATION TO PARTIES IN ISLAM 97
disobedience against authorities whom they regarded as irreligious,
and who hoped to gain the martyr's crown by combating these.
The change in the meaning of 'martyr', of which we shall deal in
more detail in one of the excursuses of this volume, was also to
serve the same tendency.
The above group of traditions has been listed without chrono-
logical order, since. in the absence of chronological criteria of even
relative certainty, it is impossible to establish one. It may be
supposed, however, that the basic idea of this group of l.>adIths
goes back to the first century when the contrast between the spirit
of the government and the ideals of the pious was most deeply felt.
People who were not inspired by the defiance of a Sa'id b. al-
Musayyib but sought a modus vivendi with the powers that be, like
the accommodating theologians whom we have just met, probably
spread in those days the traditions which advised submission to the
dejacto government. The rule of those 'Abbasid caliphs who, without
impairing religious life deviated from orthodoxy in the formulation
of revealed dogma and persecuted the orthodox, might also have
given occasion for contemplation about the relation of a religious
community to such rulers; the more reconcilable amongst the pious
would possibly have been moved to develop further those appeasing
and mediating principles in the interest of the common weal.
These principles also reveal the influence attributed by the
theologians to the ijma', the regard to which,-as we have seen at
the end of the last chapter, was fitted to help in many theological
perplexities. There was to be no insubordination against a ruler
recogulzed by the whole umma even if he had lost the right of the
Muslim ruler in the sense of strict religious demands.
Another example will show how greatly the principle of the ijma' [98]
influenced the views of Muslims in judging political circumstances.
III
Orthodox Islam had a interest in preventing the prin-
ciple of a hereditary caliphate from taking root in the consciousness
of believers. The 'Abbasid rule no doubt meant the victory of the
legitimist principle and the transmitters of religious teaching
supported this dynasty, though not as the representatives of
legitimacy but as the actual owners of power whose rights had been
proved by the unanimous homage of the community (ijma' al-
umma).' In the teaching of orthodox Islam this ijmii' alone is the
1 According to Kremer, Herrscnenden Idem, p. 409, this view dates back to
the ideas of the ancient Arabs. A poet living under Islam, but nevertheless a
typical Arab, might be quoted in this context. He is •Abd Allah b. Abi Tha'lab
(Hudhayl, 242:63): imiimun idhaokktahafa'l' alimunayalta'imuna •alayki'lti' ama.
1 Cf. Tab., II, p. 177 (Ibn 'Umar to Mu'awiya). Inheritance of sovereign
rights is called by the pions sunnat kisrii, (sunna of pagan empires),
al-Suyilti, Ta'rlkh, pp. 76. 2; 78, 6.
2 Fragm. hist. arab.. p. 145; cf. a saying by Ma'mCm On the relation of the
caliphate to the ijma' al-umma, al.Mas'ildi, VII, pp. 41ff. Such words are
intentionally attributed to 'Abbasid rulers. Even during the time of the
Egyptian puppet caliphate the ifmii' was still pointed out with gusto, see the
document of homage, al-Suyftti, op. cit., p. 199, [ibid, p, 39].
:I AI-Shahrastani, p. 51. He who denies the ifma' like Ibrahim
(see above p. 87, note) also confesses to the doctrines of illegitimacy of the first
caliphs.
• Cf, also Snouck Hurgronje, Kl'itik der Beginselen, part 2, pp. 65, 68 (off.
print). [Verspreide Geschr., II, pp. Z05-6, ZOg-IO}.
/; A great number of l;1adiths were made up which clearly speak of the
succession of Abo Bakr, 'Umar, 'Uthman, e.g. B. Adab, no. II7. It is
interesting to observe that this attitude made theologians UDder al-Mu'taQ.id
prevent the promulgation of an anti·Umayyad edict by the caliph; Tab., III,
pp. 2164, bottom. 2177, bottom.
Cl Al·Ya'qUbI, II, p. 355, 9: f'ajul tarfa'uku'l·fitna wa.ta4a·uhu'l-su1tna.
7 E.g. ibid, II, p. 42Z, top.
S Abft aI-HudhaIi opens the whole gamut of these arguments in a
spirited address, Agh., XXI, p. 145, top.
measure of the ruler's title to authority.' The imam who is recog-
nized by the will of the whole community-al-imam a/..mujlama'
'alayhi-is the rightful imam.' Al-imama lfi lan'aqid ilia bi-ijma'
at-'/unma Ian bikrat abihim;3 this was the teaching particularly against
those who wished to confine legitimacy to the 'Alid family.' Unless
the rights of the first three caliphs and of the whole of the Umayyad
caliphate were to be subjected to doubt, and thus so to speak the
whole legal continuity of the Islamic polity during the first century
[99] dangerously underruined, which orthodox teachers did not wish,
5
the ijmii' al-umma upon which the legitimacy of those pre-'Abbasid
periods rested, had to be taken as the only valid yardstick for a
judgement of the political affairs of the empire. The ijma' alone
could be sunna. Rebellions against the government and subversion,
even if justified theoretically by legitimist arguments, are filna
and as such opposed to the sunna.-
The 'Abbasid rulers themselves, of course, and thcir political
representatives and propagandists, have asserted the rights of
legitimacy against the Umayyads, and putting this principle on
their standard brought the whole of the Islamic world under their
rule. The khu!bas quoted by historians from the early years of the
rule of the house of 'Abbas show that it was chiefly the arguments
of the right of inheritance which were propounded from the pulpits
in those days.' It must be considered that the Umayyads, as well
and their adherents, took great pains to adduce genealogical argu-
ments for the claims of their dynasty.- They thought themselves
nobler than the family nearest to the Prophet, and could not get
9
8 VOLUME TWO: CHAPTER 3 THE !;!ADiTH ITS RELATION TO PARTIES IN ISLhM 99
over it when the latter was praised as the noblest branch of the
tribe of Quraysh. The poet Ibn Mayyiida was whipped because he
put the kin of Muhammed above that of the B. Marwiin in one
of his poems.1. The survival. of such views was to be overcome by
dynastic !)amth. The most perfect of these I)adiths, and also the
most transparent in its purpose, is this:
2
Jubayr b. Mut'im reports that he and 'Uthman b. 'Affiin took the
Prophet to task about the fact that he divided the fifth of the war
booty (which according to Sura 8:42 has to go to the Prophet
himself, his close relatives-li-dhi'l-qurbci-as well as to the poor and [100]
orphaned) amongst the B. Hashim and the B. I-Muttalib. I said:
'0 Apostle of God, you have given a share to our brothers the B.
I-Mutt_lib but have given nothing to us, though Our relationship to
you is the same as theirs." Th,e Prophet answered to this: 'The
B. Hashim aud B. I-Muttalib are the same." Jubayr said: 'He did
not give anything to the B. 'Abd Shams and the B. Nawfal of this
fifth, as he had given to the B. Hashim and B.l-Muttalib.'
The dynastic-legitiruistic character of this !)adith is obvious. The
offspring of the line of 'Abd Shams, ancestor of the Umayyads, are
to be slighted as against his brother Hashim from whom stem the
'Abbasids. But arguments from family law were also to be brought
into play against the 'Alids as well. It is remarkable that secular
poetic literature, whose representatives were favoured with rich
gifts by the 'Abbasids, is filled with these arguments.
The main concern was to prove the legitimacy of the 'Abbasidsl>
against the 'Alids, who were the truly legitimistic pretenders. They,
since they had never been able to rely on the ijma' a/..umma but had
always been candidates of only a fraction of Islam, had to maintain
the hereditariness of the caliphate in order to prove their claims;
this hereditary claim they had to apply to one of their lines, of
which there were very many. - The 'Abbasid caliphs, who at the
first period of the rise of their dynasty, looked jealously at any
respect paid to the 'Alids' and were continuously haunted by the
ghost of 'Alid machinations (al-Ma'miin agreed to a dangerous
1 Agk., 11. p. 102, sf!; d. a verse by A'sha Hamdan, Agh.. V, p. 160, 16, in
relation to the B. Marwa.n: wa.kkayra Qurayshin Ji arumatanl
wa-' akramahttm illa.:Z-ntW'lya Mubammadan.
I The exchange of letters bet\veen Mu'awiya and . Ali illuminates tliis
passage, Abil Han. Din., pp. 199, 17,200,4-6.
S B. Manaqib, no. 3.
ol Abil Diiwud, II, p. ZI; cf. the commentaries on the passage of the Koran
referred to (al-Bay<;1awi. I, p. 367, Z4).
6 [I assume that the 'zuriick zubeweisen' of the original, which hardly gives a
sense in this context. is a scribal error for something like 'za beweisen'. SMS.]
Cl 'No family in the world has more male o:f£spring than that of Abft Talib',
Ibn al-Faqih al.Hamadani, p. 75, 8.
7 Cf. e.g. Agh., XXI, p. 120, 19.
Is the Prophet's uncle nearer to him in genealogical succession
than is his nephew?
And which of them is more worthy to succeed him and who has
the right to claim his inheritance?
If 'Abbas has the greater right and 'All afterwards also claims
relationship. S
Then may 'Abbas' sons be his heirs, as the uncle must remove
the nephew from inheritance-
concession to them), liked to listen to their court poets and other
flatterers reciting arguments against the pretensions of their rivals.
Perhaps they thought that such ideas could easily penetrate to the
people by this route. We learn that Harlin al-Rashid demanded of
his poets that 'they combine his own praise with refutation of the
claims of 'All's descendants and with attacks against the latter."
[101] This report explains why so many subtle points of the law of in-
heritance are to be found in the poems by 'Abbasid court poets. In
these poetic circles an argument is spun Qut which culminates in
the point that even under the law of inheritance the offspring of the
Prophet's uncle ('Abbas) have more right to the inheritance than the
offspring of the daughter'S husband' or that inheritance should go
to the uncle rather than the nephew.
this poem is recited before Harlin al-Rashid by the poet Aban b.
'Abd al-J:1amid' on the initiative of the Barmecides.'
AJ-Mu'ammal, a court poet of al-Mahdi, went further even than
that, and quoted the Koran in order to prove that 'Abbas is the
rightful heir to the prophct (wiirithuhu yaqinan).' For a reward of
ten thousand dirhams-the generous Hanin gave twice that to
Aban-the weak-headed al-Mutawakkil could hear the following
didactic poemfrom Marwan b. Abi'l-Janlib:
Yours is the inheritance of Muhammed, and by your justice is
injustice banned,
The daughter's children desire the rights of the caliphate but
theirs is not even that which can be put under a nail;
1 Ibid" XII. p. 17.9.
2 Al-Mubarrad, p. 284, dates poems with similar tendencies back to earlier
times; d. Marwan b. Abi I:Iaf?U-in Agh., IX, p. 45, 16.
3! give the translation of this heuristic: twa-kana 'Aliyyan ba'da dhiika
'alii sabab' with great reserve; d. also nasabultum wa-sababuhum Agh., XXI,
p. 145, 2.
4 Part I, pp. 182-3.
~ Agh., XX, p. 76; d. XII, pp. 18, 13; 18, 20.
6 Ibid., XIX, p. 148, 6, from the bottom, or as another poet says (in respect
of the hereditary claims of the 'Alids): the 'Abbiisids are warithu' l·nabiyyi
bi'amn' l'baqqi ghayri' ]·takiidhubi, Agh., III, p. 91, 4 from the bottom.
100 VOLUME TWO: CHAPTER 3
THE :I;IADITH ITS RELATIO'N TO PARTIES IN 'ISLAM IOI.
The daughter's husband is no heir, and the daughter does not
inherit the Imamate;
And those who claimyour inheritance will inherit onlyrepentance.
1
In this spirit the 'Abbasids like to hear occasionally from their [102]
flatterers that they are not only the offspring of the Prophet's uncle
but that they can be considered as direct descendants of Muhammed:
humii'bnii rasuli'tiiihi wa-'bnii'bni 'ammihiifa-qait karuma'l-jaitdiin
wa'l-abawiini.
2
By these flatteries, which they themselves suggested and approved,
it was intended to let the fact that they were not descendants of
the Prophet but only his agnates be forgotten. Generally, however,
the proof of more valid claims to inheritance was but one of the
(Abbasids' weapons; more important and carrying greater weight in
popular opinion was the fact that every single one of their rulers
had been recognized as rightful imam by the ijmii' of the community
of Muhammed.' This was the surest prop of the ruler of the Islamic
empire. This view was promoted chiefly by the theologians, who
seem to have been quite willing, as an example has shown us, to
teach in their 1).adiths of the complete worthlessness of the godless
Umayyads. As against the 'Alids they tended to emphasize the
unimportance of hereditary points of view in the interest of the
ruling dynasty. The dignity of the caliph could not just be taken by
one who through his kinship was reared heir to the Prophet. In
order to nip the contrary teaching in the bud and to withdraw
the question of the caliphate from the sphere of subtleties in the
law of inheritance, the tradition had to establish the principle that
nothing belonging to the Prophet could be subject to inheritance.
Nobody is his heir, from the point of view of civil law and therefOre
by extension also in regard to his office as ruler. His property goes
to the treasury and in the same way the community must decide
upon his successor. '
This principle appears in the following 1).adIth, which is parti-
cularly interesting for our studies since it shows how much tenden-
tious polemic infiltrated into the various exegetical discussions of
texts during later times. In a 1).adith of Abu'I-Yaman b. Nafi' whicl1
is related back to Malik b. Anas it is said: 'While 'Umarb. al-Khattab
was talking to Malik b. Aws the doorkeeper announced Yarfa b.
'Uthman, 'Abd al-Ra1).man b. 'Awf, Zubayr b. al-'Awamm and Sa'd
1 Tab., nr, p. 1466.
Z Agh., XXI, p. 130, II. The caliph al.Wathiq also is addressed by his court
poet'Ali b. al-Jahm (ibid., p. 255, 13) as 'son of the Lord of Lords' (i.e. des·
cendant of the Prophet): Hart"inu yii'bna sayyidi'l-sadiiti.
S Ibid., VIII, p. 177, 9 from the bottom: (khilaja) jama'ta biha ahw{i.'a
ummati A qmada.
[103]
[1041
I02 VOLUME TWO: CHAPTER 3
b. AbiWaqqii'!, and they were admitted. Later also 'Ali and 'Abbas
were announced and joined them. They asked the caliph to be
arbiter in their quarrel about the property which the Prophet had
found after the victory over the Jewish tribe of the B. Nadir and
which on God's order he had kept for himself. (They this
property as their inheritance since they were the Prophet's nearest
relatives.') When the assembled visitors pressed 'Umar for a decision
of the question he gave them the following verdict with reference to a
saying of Muhammed: 'I adjure you by Him through Whose per-
mission heaven and earth exist! Do not you know that the Prophet
of blessed memory has said: 'We (prophets) do not make our pro-
perty to be inherited, (Le. our estate is not like ordinary property
which is divided among the relatives according to fixed laws and
rules); what we leave is charity (i.e., belongs to the treasury)".'2 A
parallel passage introduces the same saying differently.3 Here
'A'isha tells how Fatima asked Abu Bakr after the Prophet's death
that he should hand her her share of the inheritance consisting of the
fortune which the Prophet gained as his share in war booty. Abu
Bakr then quoted to Fatima the principle: 'We do not leave any
inheritance, what we leave is for charity' (la nurith, mil taraknii
,adaqa).'
This sentenceI which, as has already been indicated, aims at
serving a great principle of public law beyond its primary civil
law interest, was inconvenient to the Shta, since their political-legal
opposition was founded mainly on the claims of inheritance by 'Ali
and Fatima and condemns the usurpation of the first caliph by
confiscating the rights of the legal heirs of the Prophet. Therefore
they change this troublesome sentence to : Iii y"rath (passive) mii
laraknii ,adaqalan (a change which cannot be properly demonstrated
in transcribed form). By means of this graphic and syntactic correc-
tion the principle attains the following meaning: 'What we leave
behind for charity cannot be inherited (but all else is subject to the
usual laws of inheritance)".' In effect, the Shi'a maintains in contrast
to the Sunnite doctrine that the Prophet's property is subject to the
same laws of inheritance as that of ordinary mortals. In order to
1 This quarrel extended right into 'Abbasid times. 'Umar II gave the
property claimed to the 'Alids; YazId II confiscated it again (al. Ya'qubI, II,
p. 366, bottom). AI-Ma'mun, who made a pact with the 'Alids, gave it back
again (ibid., p. 573) and al.Mutawakkil again included it in the state's property
(al.BaHidhurI, pp. 30-2) until the pro.ShI'ite caliph al-Munta.?ir (248) recog·
nized the 'Alid claims (al.Mas'udi, VII, p. 303).
2 B. no. 14, 40.
3 Cf. also Tab., I, pp. 1825, 9ft'.; 1826, 14, with the variant m'rath.
"B. FayrJ al.Klmms, no. I; Aba. Dawlld, II, pp. Ig--zr; d. al.TirmidhI, I, p.
30 4.
Ii Al.QastalHini, V, p. 215, IV. p. 315.
THE J;IADITH ITS RELATION TO PARTIES IN ISLAM I03
lessen the possibilities of changing the traditional sentence in the
Shi'ite mauner, Sunnite traditionalists have added the wordfii-huwa
before the last word of the story: mii taraknii fa-huwa ,adaqatun.'
All who are acquainted with Arabic syntax must realize that thi,
insertion makes impossible a change of the meaning in the manner
attempted by the Shi'a.
2
IV
In the course of this study we shall return to the fact that the
Muslim theologians treat the traditions received into the canonical
compilations with great freedom and independence. But because
of the context we shall anticipate here a phenomenon belonging to
this subject.
Muslim theologians of later times considered the non-hereditary
character of the prophetic and royal office of Mullammed as so im-
portant a point of orthodox teaching that they opposed every
slight dimming of the principle even if that meant opposing a
tradition from which a contrary view can be inferred.
The fierce opposition to every attempt to see the dignity of the
Prophet as otherthan confined entirely and exclusively to his person,
and as having continued effect in his offspring, is the main difference
between the teaching of the orthodox and of those sects which are
based upon 'Alid principles. The basic idea of that party was-the
hereditability of prophetic dignity and rule over the empire which
they strove to obtain for the family of Muhammed in the line of
Fatima. Because acceptance or rejection of this principle became
the fighting slogan between the parties, the orthodox had to try to
ensure that the tradition offered nothing which might serve as an
incontestable proof for the believers in the hereditary and legiti-
mistic principles. The good and beautiful things said of 'All and his
children in the name of the Prophet were permitted to stand' and
orthodox authorities have even propagated traditions which show a
downright ShI'ite appearance. On the other hand, however, every-
thing was to be declared as wrong which might give support to the
claims of 'Ali's descendants for special sanctity and rights to the
empire. Therefore the idea of the hereditary character of spiritual
dignity had to be eradicated. The example that we are quoting is a
typical instance of the tendency, since it shows that orthodox
1 In al.Muwaffa', IV, p. 231, the leetio vulgata has the reading: IrZ nuritk,
ma tarakna fa-kuwa $adaqatun. In the Sbaybani recension, p. 3r7, fa.kuwa is
lacking. This insertion is also in Aha. Dawlld, II, p. 21 at the end of the chapter.
S Cf. al-Mas'iidi, III, p. 56.
:s Abft 11115a. mentions this saying of the Prophet: 'I and' AU and Fatima and
l;iasan and I:,iusayn will stand on the roof of my tent at the foot of God's throne
at the day of resurrection', al.Zurqani, IV, p. I74; d. ibid, I, p. 151.
D"
[1051
25
104 VOLUME TWO: CHAPTER 3
theology opposed such traditions even when they had succeeded in
entering the canonical compilations owing to their apparently
indifferent character.
It is not really strange that orthodox tradition, despite its usual
love of minute detail in all things concerning the Prophet, finds little
to say of Muhammed's Sons and that it is always unmistakably
vague in the few accounts bearing on this point. All male offspring
of the Prophet died in infancy. The reports do not even agree whether
Ibrahim the son of the Prophet was a child of the Copt woman Maria
or of Khadija. This Ibrahim died at the age of seventeen or eighteen
months, having not yet completed his tlnre of suckling (two years).
The tradition makes tills remark about it: 'If God had decided to
have prophets after Muhammed, Ibrahim would not have died, but
there is no prophet after Muhammed." This tradition is impugned
by Some of the authoritative orthodox theologians. Thn 'Abd al-Barr
(d. 463) says: 'I do not know the meaning of this. Noah was a prophet
and all men descended from Noah. If it were certain that the
children of prophets were always prophets, all mankind ought to be
prophets.'2 AI-Nawawi (d. 676) pronounces himself even more
[106] sharply against these traditions: 'If one hands down, on the author-
ity of some of the elders, the sentence, 'If Ibrahimhad lived he would
have been prophet:'· we declare this to be wrong, to be a daring
interference with God's secrets, a bold assumption attacking great
things.'" This sentence is based On the authority of three of Muham-
med's companions. It shows how orthodox theology counters all
attempts at hinting at the possibility of the spiritual dignity of the
Prophet being hereditary. It is unlikely that theologians waited until
the nfth century before protesting against this 1).adith from which the
hereditary character of the prophecy could be inferred. Following
their usual method they have opposed this tradition with one of
their own, intending thus to nght the doctrine which could be
derived from the nrst. We believe we are justined in taking the
following as a counter-1).adith: 'If there were to be prophets after me,
it would surely be 'Umar." This was to rule out belief in the in-
heritance of the sacred character in the line of Fatima. 6
1 B. Adab, no. 108.
2 Ibn I:Iajar, I, p. 188, no. 394.
3 To this group also belongs the tradition quoted by Abo Dawiid, II, p. 43.
that the prayer of death had not been said over Ibrahim (this being the pri-
vilege of prophets and martyrs).
4 Tahdkib, It p. 133, bottom; ct. al'Qastallani, X, p. 124_
~ Al·Tirmidbi, II, p. 293; MaiiibZb aI-Sunna, II, p. 196.
, Later there was no hesitation in uttering the words: 'If there could be a
prophet after Muhammed, it would surely be al-Ghazali,' Collected treatises of
al-Suyl1p, MS. of the Univ. of Leiden, no. 474 (8), fo1. 00.
THE !.IADITH ITS RELATION TO PARTIES IN ISLAM !OS
v
From all these points it is evident that the formation of l).adiths
at the tlnre of its great advance under the 'Abbasids served the
elaboration of traditional sayings which supported the principles
upon which the descendants of 'Abbas have based their claims.
What we have seen hitherto can mostly be called negative argu-
mentation, i.e. the shaking of the opponents' foundations. After our
previous experience it will not be surprising that there were at that
time tendentious 1).adiths which supported the case of the dynasty
in even more direct ways.
We have already met (above, p. 99) one such dynastical tradition.
There are very many of them the character of which is more obvious.
To coin such phrases was so very important to the interest of the [107]
dynasty's recognition because the opposing parties-particularly
the various 'Alid factions who had been dangerous to the 'Abbasids
long enough-also circulated their fabrications amongst the people in
order to discredit their opponents on religious grounds. The Umay-
yads had already felt called upon to stir up their court theologians
into producing religious weapons against the' Alid claims, It must
have been difficult to revile in a religious form the persons of 'Ali
and his children, hallowed in the consciousness of almost all the
layers of population and about whom, very early on, an aura of
martyrdom had been created. Therefore recourse was had to the
expedient of abusing the pagan ancestor as being the archetype of
his offspring. The Prophet was made to say that Abu Talib, father of
'Ali, was sitting deep in hell: 'Perhaps my intercession will be of
use to him at the day of resurrection, so that he may be transferred
into a pool of nre which reaches only up to the ankles but which is
still hot enough to bum his brain." Naturally enough this was
countered by the theologians of the 'Alids by devising numerous
traditions concerning the glorification of AbU Tilib,2 all sayings of
the Prophet. The floods of polemic released in such counter-traditions
are interesting to observe.
In these sayings embittered conflict is hidden under an apparently
calm surface. Often it can quite clearly be seen how a particular
saying is directed against a special point enounced by the opponents.
Thus the conflict between 'Ali's followers and their opponents who
defend the legitimacy of Abu Bakr's election is mirrored in two
groups of traditions, which give the honour of being the Prophet's
1 Sprenger, Mof;ammad, II, p. 74. [B. Maniiqib a l ~ A n f a r , no. 40; Riqaq, no.
SI; Muslim, Iman, no. 360; Musnad Abmad, III, pp. 9, 50, 55; for other similar
traditions d. Wensinck, Handbook, S.v. 'Ab'1l Talib'.]
t An ample selection is to be found in Ibn I;fajar, IV, pp. 214ff, and ibid.,
p. 239; cf. B. Janrliz, no. Sr.
106 VOLUME TWO: CHAPTER 3
first follower and the first to pray with the Prophet to each of the
two respectively. These two groups of tradition can be found side
by side in al-Tabali. No other amongst them shows so clearly its
tendentious character as the saying related on the authority of
'Abbad b. 'Abd Allah: 'I heard 'Ali say: "I am the servant of God
and brother of the Apostle of God, I am the great after me
only a liar will claim this; I prayed with the Prophet nine years
[1081 before any other person did so." '1 It must be remembered here that
the honorary title of was given by Sunnite tradition to Abu
Bakr.
Inventions of l;1adiths which served special Umayyad interests,
without being of use to the general sunna, were suppressed in the
next period for reasons which we have already explained (p. 53).
Now it was more to the point to give theological support to the
'Abbasid rulers and this too took the form of traditions which
glorified the 'uncle', the ancestor of the dynasty, and defended him
against the ancestors of the opposing pretenders. If it is considered
that several of the callphs showed themselves interested in research
into traditions and their circulation (we now know how to interpret
this) it is easily understood that such fabrications were favoured and
received advancement from the highest quarters. The calfph al-
Mahdi, the third of the 'Abbiisids (I58-69), is listed by Ibn 'Adi as
an inventor of l;1adiths.' In these reports al-'Abbas is invested with
an aura of sanctity even though he had resisted the Prophet's cause
for so 10ng.
3
During a drought 'Umar is said to have referred in his
prayers (istisqa.') not only to the Prophet but also to 'Abbas, since
he appeared to him as particularly suitable for awakening God's
mercy: '0 Allah,' so he said in his prayer, 'we used to refer to the
Prophet in our requests and You have given rain; today we refer
to the Prophet's uncle (al-'Abbas), so please give us rain.' This
reference was effective.
4
A normal usageS has here been exploited in
the interest of the 'Abbasid party. The offspring of such a holy
ancestor are best snited to be the leaders of the orthodox community.
This fable also served as one of the titles to fame of the' Abbasid
callphs, who liked to hear their flattering poets refer to it. AI-
Mutawakkil has a poem engraved on a memorial coin in which it is
said of the 'family of Hashim' that by their merits rain is sent after
1 Al-Tabari, I, p. n60. [Cf. Th. Noldeke, 'Zur tendenziosen Gestaltung der
vorgeschichte des Islam's', ZDMG, LII (1838), pp. 16££. Also al-
Uthmaniyya (ef. below, p. II7) contains relevant materiaL]
S In al.Suyuti, Ta'rIkh, pp. 106, 22; rog, 17. On p. 143, 6 from below, a
l;Ladith is mentioned in the isnad of which six ealiphs are named as informants.
e E. jana'iz, no. 80. [For traditions about aI.'Abbas cf. also Noldeke's
article quoted above.]
'Agh., Xl, p. 81, TahdhJb, p. 332.
is Part I, pp. 40-1.
THE J:IADITH ITS RELATION TO PARTIES IN ISLAM 107
God had refused it for a long time.'l Ibn al-Rfuni, extols in his
dedicated to the caliph al-Mu'ta<;lid (279-89):
Your ancestor, al-'Abbas, is the one whose name did not fail when [109]
it was usedin needto gain rain,
It split the clouds by a prayer which was granted and the flashing
of lightning, bestowed water, obeyed it?
Al-'Abbas once complained to the Prophet: 'What have the
Qurayshites against us? They meet one another with friendly faces
but refuse to do likewise to us.' This made the Prophet angry, his
face grew red and he said: 'By him, in whose hand my soul rests,
belief does not enter anybody's heart unless he loves you for the
sake of Allah and his Apostle. 0 men, he who hurts my uncle hUrts
me, since a man's uncle is like his'father."
The Qurayshites who do not like 'Abbas, despite all tribal solidar-
ity, are here presumably the 'Alids. It is easily seen that the aim
was to make the recognition of the 'Abbasid claims into a religious
affair (li'lliihi wa-li-rasulihi). The dynastic tendency is also shown
by the fact that 'uncle' ('amm) is so heavily stressed in this as well
as in related sayings (see above, p. 100). From such fabrications it
was but a small step to make the Prophet declare to 'Abbas directly
that his offspring would attain the dignity of callph. 4
The pions people of this period were fond of putting the unpleasant
memory of the godless Umayyad times into the form of a l;1adifh.
The factors making for the displacement of the religious element
were to be made the object of the hatred of Muslims for all time. It
is quite possible that the pious had already done some work in this
direction in the Umayyad period itself, but it would be too daring to
make definite statement" as to the time of the origin of such l;1adJths.
What is certain is that the 'Abbasid rule greatly favoured the
propagation of such l;1adiths. To these belongs the group of traditions
in which the tribe of Thaqif, from which sprang the tyrant al-
J;Iajjaj, was condemned in the nanle of the Prophet;' also the saying
of the Prophet where he advises a man who calls his son ai-Walid:
'You name your children by the names of our Pharaohs. Verily, a
man with the name al-Walid will come who will inflict greater [110]
injury upon my community than ever did Pharaoh upon his people.'
1 AI-Muwashsha, ed. Brunnow, p: 193, 9.
S YaHmat aI-DaM, II, p. 303.
3 Al.Tirmidhi, II. p. 304, bottom; ef. TahdMb, p. 332. bottom. For §inwu
aMki, see Fleischer, Kleinere Schriften, II, p. 137; cf. also the use in Agh.,
XV, p. 90, 22.
4. Fragm. hist. arab., p. 198; cf. Abu'l.Mal;Lasin, I, p. 354.
r; Part I, p. 97.
is Fragm. kist. arab., p. 121.
The informant, Ya'qub b. Sufyan (d. 288), adds that it was believed
that al-Walid I was meant until the other Walld, grandson of 'Abd
al-Malik, came on the scene.
VI
Even more than the ruling party did the opposing factions feel it
necessary to base their claims on the authority of the Prophet's
word. Amongst them therefore the mischievious use oftendentious
traditions was even more common than with the official party. The
Sh1'a became an independent organism within the Islamic world
only very late, owing to political circumstances the discussion of
which is beyond the scope of these studies. During the first centuries
1
they formcrt within the Islamic community an oppositional stream,
divided into many channels, against the ruling caliphate. With
this lack of strict organization went a lack of a strictly dogmatic
position; their teachings develop in an unruly and free manner
from the teaching of orthodox Islam, and without that discipline
which can only grow within the fixed framework of a churclt. Even
well-meaning pious men, loyal to government and religion, have
imbibed the 'Alid preferences of the older SIll'a. Only exaggeration
of such (otherwise nnexceptionable) preferences branded people as
heretics. There are but lightly demarcated grades of this tashayyu',
as these pr€'ferences were called: there are tashayyu' basan
2
and
tashayyu' qabi[,,3 The former is often mentioned, usually as a
praiseworthy view. In early times there was no thought of a schism
4
but rather of internal propaganda favouring 'Alid pretensions-
such as the 'Abbasids owed their elevation to-which occasionally
led to political revolutions and the installing of 'Alid dynasties. The
effects, however, were at first of only local and provincial importance,
and did not result in the rise of a Sh1'a community existing at the side
of the sunna community as a separate church. In those days Shi'ism
is a branch of Islam in the same way as are other dogmatic or
ritualistic trends; it is a madhhab and not a sect.' Only the ex-
tremists amongst them, i.e. the <exaggerators', and those who were
not satisfied with the quiet aspirations and revolted against the
ruling powers, were considered to be outside the sunna. The leaders
and promoters of this free propaganda, among whom, because of the
nature of spiritual life in Islam, theological as well as political
points came to the fore, liked to make the word of God and of the
1 Cf., for the inner meaning of the Shi'a in those days. see the fundamental
discussion by Snouck Hurgronje in Mekka,l, pp. 26ff.
2 Cf. Houtsma, in the preface to his edition of Ya'ql1bi, p. ix.
3 Agh.. VIII, p. 32. 6.
4 See Literaturgesch. deY SM'a., p. 7. 24.
5 The change.o....er to sectarianism can be seen in circumstances such as
those described by Ibn I:Iawqal, ed. de Goeje, p. 65, 21.
(111]
108 VOLUME TWO: CHAPTER 3
THE IjADiTH ITS RELATION TO PARTIES IN ISLAM rog
Prophet fight for them. The Koran is one of the most preferred
weapons in these circles, in two ways.
As is known, these circles accuse the followers of the orthodox
teaching of the Sunna with having falsified the Koran and fitted
it to their own views by means of omissions. They suspect 'Uthman,
who caused the redaction of the current text of the Koran, of having
suppressed five hundred words of the revealed text including the
sentence 'Verily, 'Ali is the guidance'.' In Sura 25:30 the passage
'If only I had not chosen so-and-so (Juldnan) as friend' is said to have
originally contained a proper name which was omitted and replaced
by the indefinitejulan.- Everybody knows the Shi'ite Surat al-Nar'
which was made known in Europe by Mirza Kazembeg.
Orthodox theology has from times of old stigmatized the attempts
of the 'Alid party to declare the current Koran as falsified and to
prepare it for their purposes by all sorts of interpolations under the
name of restitutio in integrum. They accused their opponents of
falsifying the text of the holy scriptures in tendentious manner
like Jews and Christians' and attributed to the Prophet (in later
collections of traditions): 'I have cursed six kinds of men and
they were cursed also by God and by all prophets who had God's
ear: he who adds to the book of God, etc.' refer to this movement.
This quarrel between the followers of the sunna and 'Alid partisans
extends into modern times. I quote a few typical words from
Rycaut's work, which show how this quarrel was conceived of in the
popular opinion of his times.
Rycaut says: 'The Turk also accuses the Persian of corrupting
the Alchoran, that they have altered words, misplaced the Comma's
and Stops, that many places admit of a doubtful and ambiguous
sense, so that those Alchorans which were upon the Conquest of
Babylon brought thence to Constantinople are separated and
compiled in the great Seraglio, in a place apart, and forbidden with a
Curse on any that shall read them.' In the writing of the Mufti As'ad
~ f e n d i against the_SIll'ites: 'You deny the verse called the Covering
m the Alchoran [Sura 88] to be authentJck; you reject the eighteen
Verses, which are revealed to ns for the sake of the holy Aische."
Such biased changes in the Koran belong, however, to the time
1 Literaturgesck. dey Ski'a, p. I4 [for the Shi'ite accusations about omissions
and Ialsiftcations in the Koran, and their exegesis, see Goldziher, Die Richtungen
derislamiscltenKoranauslegungen (Leiden, 1920), pp. 270 ff.]
I Majiitil) al-Gkayb, IV, p. 470 [cf. Goldziher, Richtungen, pp. 287 if.]
3 The whole of this material can be found in Noldeke's Gesck. des Qorans.
pp. 216-20 [2nd ed.• II, pp. 93-II2.]
4 Al.'lqd. I, p. 269, in a parallel between Rawafiq: and the Jews.
.' !'lettey6ffnete Ottomanische Pjo,.te, I. pp. 82a, 84a. [Here quoted from the
orIglnal: P. Rycaut, The Present State of the Ottoman Empiye, London, 1668,
pp. IIg and I21.]
(112
when the Shi'a is beginning to move away from the body of Islam
faithful to the sunna. Older and more widely spread is the endeavour
to obtain belief for the assertion that the followers of the SUIUla
falsified the interpretation of the Koran.
1
The correct interpretation
of a number of important passages which were suppressed by the
Sunnites affords the best proof of the justification of these 'Alid
aspirations. In their opinion the Koran contains teachings about the
shaping of the future as well as about the circumstances of their
own times.
2
A saying ascribed to the Prophet and quoted by Jabir
al-Ju'fr, zealous theological defender of 'Alid theories (d. 128),3
has bearing on this: 'I go to war for the recognition of the Koran as
the book of God and 'Ali will fight for the interpretation of the
Koran.'4 This Jabir, who was an influential disseminator of tradi-
[1131 tions in K;jfa-Abu I:Ianifa judges him as the most mendacious of an
contemporary mubaddithinS-made great efforts to and references
to 'Ali in the Koran;' even the dabbat al-arq. of Muslim eschatology
is in his opinion nothing else but 'Ali reappearing on earth at the
end of timc.
7
The 'Alids use especially verses where, as in 42:22,
mention is made of the love of relatives (al-q"rbal and their rights
(59:7)-in the same way as 'Abbasid propaganda made use of them
in their dayS-in order to find allusions to the ahl al-bayt and
confirmation of their sacred character in the revelation.
9
1 It is so obvious to Muslims that the political interests of a party are pursued
with the aid of la'wil that:J. .;;aying on Persian politics by Khusraw Anushirwau
assumes that even tbe shaping of Persian politics was influenced by the inter-
pretation of the sacred books; al-!:Iasau al-' Abbasi, Athiir al·Uwal jf Tart'tb
al-Dz/wal, p. 53.
2 Al-Mas'ftdi, V, p. 221 ult.
3 The Sh1' ites hand down a K. al- Ta!sir by him to ,....hich more material was
added in latertimes, al·Tl1si, Shi'a Books, p. 73, 4; cf, p. 244, 6.
Ibn Bajar, I, no. 59; cf. al.Mas'udi, IV; p. 358 penult.; V, p. 13, 4.
ziller, Richtungen, p. 278.] The Shi'ite theologians continuously fight for the
freedom of Koran exegesis (aZ.tajsfr bi'Z·ra'y) against the teaching of orthodox
exegetes who only permit the traditional explanation founded on the 'ilm
(al-Tirmidhi, II, p. 156). See for this the excerpt from a commentary on the
Nahj aZ-Balagha (the collected speeches of 'AB) in KashkfU, p. 370.
t. In Tab. I;Ittf/., IV, no. "25.
a Muslim, I, p. 5t, in regard to Sura 12:80, to which we shall refer in our
study on the veneration of saints. The reference is admittedly far from clear.
7 AI-Damiri, I, p. 403,
S Pragm. kist. arab., p. zoo. [Sura 4Z:22 was also inscribed on the coins of
the 'Abbasid partisans; see G. C. Miles, Numismatic History of Rayy, pp. I5-7;
idem, Excavation coins from the Persepolis region, p. 67; S. M. Stern, Numismatic
Ckro1ticle, 1961, p. 261.]
9 Sunnite polemists did not fail to notice that this explanation, propagated
by !:Iusayn an 'Alid partisan, suffers from an anachronism in that
Muhammed is supposed to have spoken of Fatima's family in a Meecan reve·
lation, whereas her marriage with' Ali only took place in the year 2 A.H.,
Qastallani, VII, p. 370.
IIO VOLUME TWO: CHAPTER 3
•
THE I;iADlTH ITS RELATION TO PARTIES IN ISLAM III
This field of research occupies large space in Shi'a literature. This
is easily seen when going through the Shi' a bibliography which was
compiled by al-Tusi in the fifth century. Fakhr al-Din al-Razi's
great taJsir always refers polemically to such passages used by the
Shi'a and this work affords an easy insight into the direction of
Shi'ite tendentious exegesis.' The partisans of 'Alid claims of course
also annex all those passages which Sunnite exegesis-perhaps only
in reaction to the endeavours of their opponents-relates to Abu
Bakr? The Sunnite party also liked to look for Koranic passages
in which one could find expressed the prior right of Abu Bakr,3
without however giving dogmatic value to such research and
interpretation. Muslim theologians have continued to display a
partiality for discussing such questions with much gravity and great
fanaticism. On his expedition against Daghestan, Nadirsh;lh [1141
attended in Qazwin a dispute of both parties regarding Sura 48:29;
some referred this verse to 'All, others to the four caliphs. But as
this verse contains a reference to ta"rat and injfi, the prince ordered
Mirza Mu1)ammad from (author of the Ta'rikM-jih<in-
g"shi!y) to ask the Jews and Christians for information as to the
correct interpretation of this verSe. With their aid a decision was
made in favour of the Sunnites.' Sectarian branches of the ordinary
'Alid party, e.g. the Druzes, made special exegetic connections of
their own;" the Druzes consulted not ouly the Koran (e.g. Sura
24:39) but also the Bible, where they found a number of pro-
phecies referring to the God-man al-I:Iakim.
6
But nothing was more common in 'Alid circles than to refer 'the
tree cursed in the Koran' (17:22 al-shajara al-mal'una ji'l-Q"r'an)
to the Umayyad house, and this connection is still very popular.
In Shi'a writings' it has remained usual up to recent times to call
the Umayyad dynasty al-shajara al-mal'una. The 'Abbiisids also
favoured the use of this expression for the dynasty which they
destroyed,' whereas they refer 'the blessed tree whose roots are
finn and whose branches reach 1'0 heaven' (Sura T4:29) to their own
1 E.g. Majiitil}, II, p. 700; VIII, p. 392.
ZEsp. Sura 92:17; MajatfJ;, VIII, p. 592.
$ Such a passage is 57:tO, Ma!iiU!J" VIII, p. 124, cited from al·KaIbi.
4. 'Abd aI.Karim. Voyage de, l'inde ala Mekke, transl. pp. 88-g1.
5 Petermann, Reisen im Orient, I, p. 394.
o See roy article in Geiger's Jud. Zeitscltr. fW. u.L., XI (1875), p. ]8.
7 I remember a passage in the Rasa'it of al·h.'llarizmi which I cannot find
now.
S Abu'I-MaI:;lasin, I, p. 365. Har'em aI-Rashid uses this expression of the B.
Umayya, Tab., III, p. 706, 14. Cf. also aM bayt al·la'na with this meaning, ibid.,
Ill, p. 170, 6. In the decree of the caliph al-Mu'taq.id against the memory of
the Umayyads (from the year "284), Tab., ITI, pp. zr68, 4, 2I70, 5: 'There is no
difference of opinion about the fact that al-ShcJ:iara al.mal't1na means the B.
Umayya.', Abulfeda, An'n-ales, II, p. 278.
II
VII
family.' The 'Alid is Ibn shajarai Tuba.· They also liked to find their
own empire prophesied in the Koran and gladly allowed their train-
[115] bearer to find such connections.
3
The favouring of this interpretation
by the' Abbasids and their court theologians finally caused it to be
accepted even by the most orthodox exegetes of the Koran, and
even if they were enemies of the Shi'a.4.
1 AI. Ya'qCl.bi, II, p. 493 (1. 15 nabit read thabit).
2 Al.Mas'iidi, V, p. 6. penult.
S A flatterer at the court of the caliph al·Mahdi gave this explanation for
SOra 16:70-I: The bees are the B. Hashim, the healing drink which flows from
their bodies is science , ....hieh they spread, Agh., III, p. 30; cf. aI·DamIn, II, p.
407, 'where the story is put in the timeo! Abil Ja'far al·Man:?o.r.
, C£' Qutb aI-DIn, CItron. Mekka, p. 87, bottom.
S In contrast, in Sunnite circles it is taught that even in the case of
tM·ta'yfn the iimii'al-umma is always decisive; al.Shahrastani. p. 85, (s.v.
Kardimiyya) .
6 Ibn Khaldo.n, Muqaddima. pp. 164ff.
7 Cf. Ibn al-Faqill al.Hamadani, p. 36, 7.
1 See another pro-' Alid Khumm·tradition in Tahdhfb, p. 439, top, where
there are given also other l;tadiths withsimiIar points from aI·Tirmidhi and aI-
Nasa.'i. AI-Nasa-'i had, as is well known, pro-'Alid inclinations, and also aI-
Tirmidhi included in his collection tendentious traditions favouring 'Ali,
e.g. the tradition.
% See the detailed information in Literaturgesch. der Ski'a, p. 61; d. Ibn al
w
Athir, IX, p. 58. The festival in honour of Abl1. Bakr introduced in 389 as a
counterweight to the' Alid festival is said to refer to SUra 9=4°; the Companion
mentioned there was Abl1. Bakr. (For the tradition of Ghadir Khumm see also
Goldziher, Vorlesungen, p. 239: EI, s.v. 'Ghadir al-Khumm'.]
THE 1;IADITH ITS RELATION TO PARTIES IN ISLAM 113
by a different interpretation) is the tradition of Khumm, which
came into being for this purpose and is one of the firmest foundations
of the theses of the 'Alid party.
In the valley of Khumm between Mecca and Medina three miles 116]
from al-Jahfa there is a pool (ghadir) surrounded by trees and bushes,
which serves as drainage for rain-water. Under one of the trees took
place-according to a tradition by aI-Barl.' b. 'Azib.-the scene which
is so important for <Ali's followers. The tradition relates: 'Once we
travelled in the Prophet's company. When we rested near Ghadrr
Khumm we were called to prayer. In the shade of two trees we
prepared a place for the Prophet and he performed his midday
prayer there. Afterwards he took' AIi's hand and said 'Do you know
that I have greater power over the Muslims than they have them-
selves?' 'Yes', we answered and when he repeated this question
several times we gave the same reply each time. 'So know then that
whose master I am, their master is 'AIi also. 0 God, protect him
who recognizes 'Ali and be an enemy to all who oppose 'AIi." When
the Prophet finished this speech the future caliph 'Umar stepped
towards 'Ali and said: 'I wish you luck, son of Abu Tilib, from this
hour you are appointed the master of all Muslim men and women." ,
It is obvious that the Shi'ites accord the greatest importance to this
tradition and consider it to be the firmest support of their doctrine.
An annual feast which was promoted also by the Buyids was to keep
the memory of the covenant of the Ghadrr alive.- The Sunnites, who
do not reject this tradition do not see in it a proof of the immediate
caliphate of 'Ali after the Prophet's death.
Another specifically 'AIid tradition less accepted in orthodox
cireles is an episode told by SIll'ites from the life of the Prophet. It
is usually condemned under the name of 1;adiih al-fayr, i.e. 'bird
tradition' (derogatory). The intention to exalt the 'Alid family is
connected to an apparently unimportant detail. Of the various
versions we give that which shows the tendentious attitude most
eIearly. Once upon a time the Prophet was given as a present a
bird-it is debated in the various versions what kind of bird it was; [117]
the Prophet ate it and found it to be very tasty. He said: '0 God,
may you send to me (as guest) the man whom you love most of all
j,
J
I
VOLUME TWO: CHAPTER 3 II2
In the fabrications of party !)adrths the tendentious work of the
partisans of 'Alid aspirations could unfold itself more freely and
with less restraint than in the interpretation of a given sacred text.
We will not consider the vast masses of traditions aiming at the
glorification of 'Ali and other members of his family, many of which
have found their place in the compilations of orthodox authorities.
For the purpose of this chapter those !)adiths are of particular
interest which were general politico-legal principles formed in
order to embody the 'AIid Shi'a.
The 'Alid cause would have been in a sad plight if it had been
based entirely upon the principle of legitimacy. The followers of the
party must have felt ,after the rise of the 'Abbasids that they were
facing weighty objections from the point of view of hereditary law
in tills field (see p. IOO). A stronger argument in their favour (which
they used independently from legitimistic claims) was their con-
viction that the Prophet had expressly designated and appointed
'Ali as his successor before his death, so that the succession of Abu
Bakr was an invalid usurpation because the caliphate of 'AIi im-
mediately after the Prophet had been sanctioned' by means of
wa-ia'yin, i.e., by means of explicit appointment,
6
or in other words
by means of 7 i.e., a last will. Therefore the 'Alid adherents
were concerned with inventing and authorizing traditions which
would prove 'AIi's installation by direct order of the Prophet. The
most widely known tradition (the authority of which is not denied
even by orthodox authorities, though they deprive it of its intention
II4 VOLUME TWO: CHAPTER 3
creatures.' Anas was the doorkeeper when 'Ali arrived. Anas did
not wish to let him enter-in some versions he repeatedly refused
to let him enter-until 'Ali, pretending urgent business, forced
his entrance. When the Prophet upbraided him for his late arrival
'Ali told him of Anas' behaviour towards him. The latter justified
himself by saying that he had hoped that an An.ari would come
first. The Prophet exclaimed: '0 Anas! is there anyone amongst the
who is bettcr than or preferable to tAli?'l The partisans of
'Ali also relate a number of other traditions which are meant to
prove that the Prophet gave a direct order for 'Ali to be his successor.
To counteract the effect of these traditions, orthodox theologians
of the Sunna have cut the Gordian Knot by circulating traditions
showing that before his death the Prophet had made no testament
at all.' If this political tendency in the background were not known,
it would be hard to see why there are disproportionately numerous
sayings dedicated to relating in minute detail the single circumstance
that the Prophet had died without making a will,> and more es-
pecially that he had appointed no successor.< These traditions of
course do not say a word about the Prophet not naming 'Ali or
someone else as his heir, the general fact that the Prophet had made
no last will, either about the future of the Islamic community or of his
private property, inferred the incorrectness of the opponents' claims.
[118] In one version of the tradition, however, this intention is clumsily
transparent. It was mentioned in the presence of 'A,'isha that the
Prophet had made a will in favour of 'Ali. She said: 'When could this
have happened? I had his head held against my breast, (variant:lap)
he asked for a cup, then felt very unwell and died before I could really
notice it. When could he possibly have made the will in question?
That great group of traditions, in which 'Ali himself is said to have
protested against the opinion that the Prophet had told everything
of importance (except the Koran) to a single person but had kept
this from the community at large, must be seen in the same light.
This teaching, which is repeated again and again in many versions,
on many different occasions,5 is a polemic against the teaching of
the followers of 'Ali whereby 'Ali, as the Prophet's and exe-
1. AI.Damiri, II, p. 400. AI-Tirmidhi, II, p. 299 has incorporated this 'Alid
tradition in his collection (as he did others, see above, p. II3 note I) with the
note 'gharib'; [d. also aZ·Utkmaniyya, pp. 149-50.]
2 See a collection of the sentences concerned in al-Baghawi, II,
p. 192; d. Tab., I, p. 1810,20.
3 Muslim, IV, p. 9I.
" Ibid, p. 267.
Ii B. 'Ilm, no. 40; jihad, no. 169; jizya, no. 10; Diyat, no. 24; Muslim, III,
p. 291; above, p. 27.
II The Shi'ites also call rightful successors of 'Ali by this name, Agk., VIII,
p. 32, 8.
,
.-
,
-----
--

THE J.IADITH ITS RELATION TO PARTIES IN ISLAM Ir5
eutor of his intentions, was in the possession of information that the
Prophet had withheld from the community. This polemical intention
was strengthened by letting such protestation stern from 'Ali himself.
This part of the l;1adith is thus, as the above examples have shown,
a battlefield of the political and dynastic conflicts of the first few
centuries of Islam; it is a mirror of the aspirations of various parties,
each of which want to make the Prophet himself their witness and
authority.
VIII
Apart from the tendentious traditions intended to serve as
authority for the doctrines of a political or religious party, another
use of the l;1adith for party purposes must be mentioned: the inter-
polation of tendentious words into l;1adiths which in their original
form were unsuitable for the purposes of party politics. The aim was
the addition of a few decisive words to make an otherwise com-
pletely neutral tradition serve the tendencies of the party; and the
newly invented part was to pass unchallenged under the flag of the
well-authenticated part. The 'Alid party used such interpolations
rather more frequently than did their opponents; at least it is an
often repeated accusation against the Rawafi<;l that they thus falsified
sacred texts. Two examples will serve to show us the nature of such
interpolations, one introducing us to an 'Alid, the other to a Sunnite
interpolation:
It is sufficiently well known from history that the Umayyads
introduced themselves as the legal successors of the caliph 'Uthman
and that the persecutions against their opponents, the hostilities
opened against 'Ali and the 'Alids, were in the name of blood
revenge (Ina'r) for the murdered 'Uthman.' 'Uthman is the symbol
and slogan of Umayyad aspirations
2
in contrast to <Ali, who serves
this pnrpose for the opposing camp. 'Uthrnani, (collective: 'Uth-
maniyya) is therefore the party name of the zealous followers of the
Umayyad dynasty.3 This name underwent various transformations.
It soon ceased to have only genealogical meaning< and served to
1 Ab'o. !;Ian. Din., pp. IS0, 20; 164. II; 170; I8r, II; 266, 10,
I Kremer, He.rrsche.nden Ide.en, p. 355.
! It is inexplicable that b. aI.'Abbas (in Ibn Durayd, p. 201, 14,
'b. 'Ayyash') can be described in Fihrist, p. 90,5-6, as Khariji and 'Uthmani
at the same time. It is also reported elsewhere that he was a follower of the
Umayyads, in contrast to his family who were partisans of 'Ali. Ibn Durayd,
I.e.; Ibn Qutayba, p. 172, ult. [Cf. Lammens, Etudes, p. 121 =MFOB, II, p. 13.]
" Originally it had a merely genealogical connotation, being the name gh;en
to a person descended from the caliph 'Uthman, Agh., VII, p. 92, II; XIV,
pp. 165, 20; 169, 17; cf. Fragm. kist. arab., p. 237, 4, 6. [More examples it'
Lammens, Etudes, p. IIg=MFOB, n, p. II; Et1'des, p. rI2=MFOB, II,
p. 14, there are some data about the 'Uthmaniyya party.J
•
[119]
denote people who did not wish to participate in 'Ali's battles for
the caliphate and who condemned the murder of 'Uthman. The
An.ari poet I;Iassan b. Thabit was considered an 'UthmanL' When
'Ali had also died and the watchword 'Uthman or 'Ali had ceased
to have real importance, the name was applied to the opponents of
'Ali's claims and to people who were not prepared to acquiesce in
the jait accompli of 'All's and his family's downfall and the as-
cendancy of Mu'awiya-those who accept the current jait accompli
are the true Sunnites'-but who put 'Uthman above 'Ali and thought
he had greater claims to the caliphate than had the Prophet's son-
lll-law. The chief specific differentia of an 'Uthmani in that genera-
tion is said to be that he 'abuses 'Ali and keeps people away from
al-I;Iusayn.'4 This means that the 'Uthmaniyya 'prefer the Banu
Umayya to the Banu Hashim and, as is stressed, give precedence
to Syria above Medina.' 5 All those governors of the first Umayyad
caliph who were not satisfied with a recognition of the ruling
caliph alone but demanded direct acknowledgement of 'Uthman's
claims and who condemned to a crnel death all those who gave the
oath of allegiance 'alii sunnat 'Umar, though this included a tacit
recognition of the non-'Alid caliphate, were 'Uthmaniyya.' They
insisted on an unconditional recognition of the 'martyr' 'Uthman,
whom they attempted to elevate to a high religious pedestal.
"'Uthman is equal to 'IsO. b. Maryam before God.'" This political
confession was with preference also called din tUtkman or ra'y
al-'Uthmiiniyya' just as the confession of the opposing party was
called din 'Ali.' In an extended meaning, any blindly loyal follower
of the Umayyad cause could be called 'UthmanLlO
In the same way as, in general, theoretical quarrels which bear no
relation to reality have continued in Islam up to recent times to
form the watchwords of parties, the confession of the 'Uthmani
1 AI-Mas'Ctdi, IV, p. 284.
Z This was especially applied to all those who did not greatly care about
dynastic claims but who recognized all existing facts in past and future on the
grounds Ol the ijma'. 'i characterizes the Islamic regions as follows:
Bai?ra is 'Uthmiini, Kufa is 'Alid, Sham Umayyad and l:fijaz Sunnitc; al'Iqd,
Ill, p. 356.
3 Agh., XV, p. 27, 9, from the bottom, al·Ya 'qiibi, II, p. u8, 5; d, B.
Jihad, no. 192: 'an AM 'Abd al-RaZlman wa·kana '1tthmaniyyan jaqiiIa Zi'bni
'Atiyya wa·kiina 'Alawiyyan.
4 AI-Baladhur1, p. 308, 3.
t. Agh., XV, p. 30.
6 AI-Tabari, II, pp. 419, 3; 420, 6.
, AI·'Iqd, Ill, p. 23, 7·
9 Agh., XI, p. 122,9; XIII, p. 38, 2; aI-laban, II, p. 340, 7. They are pro-
bably identical with nawii§ib, ZDMG, XXXVI, p. 281; also Abu'l-
'Ala' in Rosen-Girgas, Chrestom arab., p. 552,4.
9 Al.Tabari, II, pp. 342, 6; 350, 20.
10 A;zsiib ai-Ashraf, p. 26, 5,
[120]
II6
VOLUME TWO: CHAPTER 3
THE IJADiTH ITS RELATION TO PARTIES IN ISLAM II7
survived far into the 'Abbasid period. Under the 'Abbasids theore-
tical defenders of Umayyad claims are still called 'Uthmaniyya.'
Abu'l-Faraj al-I.fahani reports that in his day a mosque in KUla
was the seat of this 'Uthmani party' and is listed as one of
the followers of the party,
3
in whose favour he has written a book
4
though he himself refuses to be counted amongst the party.' The [121]
expression Marwaniyya6 is. however, more usual as the designation
for survivals of the Umayyad party in 'Abbasid times.' For com-
pleteness' sake let it be added that Umayyad fanatics often call the
enemy party Turabiyya
j
8
i.e. followers of (Ali. with reference to
the by-name of 'Ali (Abu Turab).' This they meant tobea derogatory
name
lO
and the followers of 'Ali defended themselves against it,"
though 'Ali himself is said to have liked this name which was given
himby the Prophet." ,
The pro-'Uthman circles, which included also those Sunnites
who did not permit opposition to the rule of 'Uthman once it was
lawfully established, collected 1,ladiths in which the Prophet calls
'Uthman a martyr, makes him equal to the other caliphs, recognizes
1. Ibn Qutayba, p. 252, 7; Abu' I-Ma1;t.asin, I, p. 406,10.
2 Agh.. X, p. 85: wa-akl tilkii al-maballa ita'·/ yawm ka-dhiilika.
3 AI.Mas''Odi, VI, p. 56; VIII, p. 34.
4 K. at.· Uthmiiniyya and Masii'it al-' Uthmiiniyya; a refutation is mentioned
by al-Trtsf, SM'g, Books. p. 331, no. 720. [This book was published by 'Abd al.
Salam Muh. Harem, Cairo, 1955. Excerpts from the refutation by al·Iskafi
are quoted in Ibn Abi'I·Habid's commentary on the Nahj al.Balligna, rIT,
pp. 253 ff., also reproduced as an appendix in the ed.]
II MS. of the Kaiser. Hofbibliothek in Vienna, N.F. no. 151, fol. sa. [K.
aZ-Hayawiin, I, p. II.]
• This designation is also opposed to Zubayriyya in Umayyad times, Agh"
III, p. 102, 8 from the bottom. A quite special use of the designation of Mar·
waniyya is found in the story in Agh., IV, p. 120, top.
'I Fleischer Leip. Cat., p. 525b, note n. Cf. AI·Maqrizi, Khi!at, I, p. 236.
composed a treatisejJ imiimat al.Marwiiniyya, al.Mas'iidi. VI, p. 56.
[A philo·Umayyad sect called Marwaniyya survived to recent times in Centra.!
Asia; see V. V. Barthold in Bulletin de l'Acaa. Imp. des Science, St Petersburg,
'9'5, pp. 643-8, trans!. in REI, VII ('933), p. 395ff.]
8 'fab.• II. p. 136, 16. The Turabi curses 'Uthman. ibid., p. 147, IS. In the
account of the gross insult inflicted upon Anas b. Malik by al.l:Iajjaj and the
satisfaction which 'Abd aI-Malik grants the pious man (see above, p. 41) in
al-Damiri, II, pp. 7If., the tyrant calls Anas: jawwalan fi'ljitan mat AU
Turiib marratan wa-ma'Ibn al-Zubayy ukhrii. etc. Likewise the ShI'ites are
called in India 'l:Iaydarl' after another ,by-name of 'Ali:.
',Ibn Hisham, p. 422; al-MaS'lldi, V, pp. 332, ult; 333 passim; 373, -s;
al- Iqa, Ill. p. 41, 21. About the probable origin of this name see de Gocje
in ZDMG, XXXVIII, p. 388.
10 Fl'ag. /sist. arab., pp. 89, r; 92, 5. from the bottom; al.Mas'l1di, V, p. 16.
ult.; zoo, 4.
11 Tab., II, p. 129, 5.
lSI. TahdMb, p. 435. 10. Occasionally we meet the name Turabiyya as a name
whIch the followers of 'Ali use of themselves, e.g. al·Mas'udi. ibid., p, 217. 7.
&2
[122]
118 VOLUME TWO: CHAPTER 3
(though only indirectly) his predestination to the caliphate and
abuses 'Uthman's enemies. Once the Prophet omits the prayer for
the body of a true believer (r;alat al-jinaza, Part I, p. 229) and when
asked his reason he replies: 'The dead man did not love 'Uthman,
therefore I refuse to recommend himto God's mercy."
Circles hostile to 'Uthman, who endeavoured to heap as much dis-
grace as they could upon the memory of the third caliph, found a
historical episode well suited for this purpose. The later caliph is
said to have fled from the battlefield during the battle of U!;lud.
An exploitation of this fact was bound to degrade him in the eyes of
any true Arab. Farrar (runaway) is no honorable name to Arabs.
The followers of 'Ali made good nse of this historical account and
the party poet, al-Sayyid al-l;Iimyan, does not forget it when giving
the reason for his faithfulness to the 'Alid cause:
jama liya dhanbun siwa annanijdhakartu-l-ladhijarra 'an Khaybari
dhakartu'mra'an jarra 'an Marba1>injjirara'I-Mmari mina'/-
qaswari.
'You can accuse me of no other sin than that I have mentioned
him who ran away from Khaybar,
I mention the man who fled from Marhab, like a donkey runs
from the lion.
12
This ridicule can only be directed against 'Uthman. The flight of
'Dtllman appears to be based on more than mere slander by his
enemies. 'Uthman's son. who has been sent as governor to Khurasan
by Mu'awiya, is snearingly reproached by the poet Milik b. al-
Rayb with his father's flight.· This would have been impossible at
so early a date if the accusation had not been based on fact. But an
even clearer proof of its truth is the fact that 'Uthman's followers
felt obliged to clear him of this shameful deed in their own way.
They admit it but seek for alleviating circumstances. This endeavour
is evident in the following !;ladith,< which is reported with reference
to Sura 3:149. Aman,' after having completed the circumambulation
of the sacred house, came and saw a group sitting together. He
asked: 'Who are those who sit together?' He was told that they were
Qurayshites. 'Who is their sheikh?' asked the stranger, and 'Umar's
son was pointed out to him. To him the man said: 'I will ask you
1 Al.Tirmidbi. II, p. 297 and other collections under Faq.fi:U or Manaqib
'Utllman, [Wensinck, Handbook, pp. 239-40.]
:!; Agk., VII, p. 13. 4 from the bottom.
S AI-Tabari", II, p. 179. Io-n.
4. In al·Ya'qubi, II, p. 116, the same accusations are said to 'Uthman's face
and he makes the same excuses as are contained in the following J:!,adith.
S In al.Tirmidbi, II, p. 296, bottom: A manfrom Egypt.
I
,
THE J:lADjTH ITS RELATION TO PARTIES IN ISLAM u9
about a matter; please enlighten me. I entreat you by the sanctity
of this house, do you know anything about 'Uthman b. 'Affan
running away on the day of U!;lud?' 'Yes' replied Ibn 'Umar. 'Do
you know anything about his remaining invisible on the day of
Badr and not participating in the fighting?' 'Yes' was the reply.
'Do you also know that he remained behind on the occasion of the
Ri<;lwan homage (in l;Iudaybiya) and did not attend it?' 'Yes', said
Ibn 'Umar. The stranger exclaimed: 'Allah akbar', but Ibn 'Umar
said to him: 'Come, I will explain all that you have asked me about.
As regards his flight from U!;lud, I testify that Allah has forgiven
him for it. He remained absent from Badr because he was married
to the daughter of the Prophet who was ill and he had to wait upon
her. But the Prophet promised him reward and the same share in
the booty as was received by those who particlpated in the battle.
And as regards his absence from the homage, this also can be
explained. If there had been a nobler man in Mecca than 'Uthman
the Prophet would have sent him in his stead to Mecca as envoy.
But as it was, he sent 'Uthman. Since the latter went to Mecca
before the homage took place the Prophet pointed with his right
hand saying: "This is 'Uthman's homage," and beating into the palm
of his left said: "This for 'Uthman." But you take this (lesson) with
yoU.'l
If 'Uthman's friends find no other expiation of his cowardice but
God's merciful pardon, it is not surprising that this fact is exploited
by his enemies. Na'thal, i.e. a long bearded,' weak, old man, is a
nickname of 'Uthman in reference to his senile weakncss
3
and
therefore the 'Uthmanis are sometimes called by their enemies
Na'thalis, i.e. 'followers of the long beard." They were also not
1 B. Maghazi, no. 19; cf. Ibn Hisha.m, p. 746, 15.
2 See Landberg, Prove-rbes et diotons, I, p. 256, and the saying: 'long beards
are the same for stupidity as manure is for the garden,' Fragm. hist. arab., p.
350, IS; Arabian Nights, 872, ed. Bulaq, IZ79, IV, p. 154, bottom. Proverbs
and epigrams about the mental deficiency of the tawil al-dhaqn, cf. Part I,
p. 128. Satirical sayings about men with long beards are to be found in Yusuf
aI·Sharbini, Razz aZ·Qu{Hlfft sharlz, qa*fdat A b ~ Skadii! (Alexandria, lith 1289),
p. 125. Early greying of the beard is also taken as a sign of mental deficiency,
aI.'!qd, II, p. 140, II. -
3 [Goldziher, 'Spottnamen der ersten chalifen bei den Schi'iten', WZKJ\;I,
xv (Igol) pp. 321 fl.; Lammens, Etudes, p. ug=MFOB, II, p. ii.] Agh., VII,
p. 23; I, XIII, p. 42, 8; Lata'if al.Ma'an/. p. 25; Ibn Qutayba, p. 132, 10.
(, The' Alid poet aI.Sayyid al·I:Iimyarl (see above, P.92) wishes to denounce
the Qaq.i SaW\v8,r to the caliph al.Man!?ur as a former enemy of the' Abbasids
who in the past allied himself sometimes to the party of 'Uthman sometimes
to that of 'AU: na'thaliyyzm;'amaliyyun lakumughayru muwatin (Agh., VII,
p. 17, g.), i.e. 'A man of the long bearded, a man of the camel battIe (the
followers of 'Ali call themselves;"amaH with reference to the battle of the camel,
Tab., II, pp. 342, 6; 350, 20) who does not obey you: Barbier de Meynard
UA, 1874. II, p. 20g) translates this line incorrectly: 'Une hyene, un chacal, qui
[123]
[124]
"
£
120 VOLUME TWO: CHAPTER 3
reluctant to alter the text of the tradition by an interpolation useful
for their ridicule. The Prophet made the heroic 'Ali the standard-
Marer of the believers and announced this to the community in tbe
following manner: 'Verily, I give this flag to a man through whose
hands God will give us victory; he loves Allah and his apostle and
Allah and His apostle love him.'l So far the generally accepted text
in al-Bukhan. But in some non-canonical versions of this tradition
there is the addition: laysa bi-jarrar, Le. the is no runaway';2 and it
will be no accident that it is Ibn Is1)aq who defends this addition,
since he was suspected by orthodox theologians of 'Alfd leanings
(tashayyu'). >
The intention to slight 'Uthmao cannot be mistaken in this inter-
polation, which was meant to manifest the contrast between the
coward 'Uthman and the victorious 'Ali. Thus there are good
reasons why this version was not incorporated in the orthodox ver-
sion of the hadUh-the same reasons for which the oldest chroniclers
of the begh,nings of Islam were divided about the relation of the
fact itself.'
We shall give an example, too, of how the tendencies of the anti-
'Alid trend gave rise to interpolations: 'The fornicator does not
fornicate when he is fornicating and is a true believer, and the
thief does not steal when he is stealing and he is a true believer, and a
wine drinker does not drink wine and he is a true believer' is the
literal translation of a traditional saying which implies: He who
fornicates, steals or drinks is no true believer. This sentence has the
following addition in one of its versions: 'andnone of youexaggerates
when he exaggerates and he is a true believer: beware then, beware.'5
Exaggeration (ghuluww) here means exaggerated love and worship
(which in the case of some extremists went as far as deification)
given to 'Ali and his family. It is evident that this addition was
[1251 made for the purposes of tendentious polemics, as it is intended to
prove to the Shi'ites that the exaggeration of their admiration for
'Ali and his family was unbelief. It was hoped that the less obvious
form of a continuation of a well authenticated saying would give it a
greater chance of diffusion and recogultion.
1 B. Maghazi, no. 40; TahdMb. p. 438, 9.
:t QastalUini to the passage., VI, p. 409.
B Wiistenfeld's introduction to the edition of Ibn Hishiim, II, p. viii, IS;
XX,3·
.. Cf. Muir, Mahomet, I, p. cH, note.
r; Muslim, I, p. 147; cf. al.Kumayt, Khi.:. al.Adab, II, p. 208, 8, akfaratni.
ne vallS rapportera den de bien: For muwiitin (ata III) cf. Zuhayr, Mu'all., v..
34; p. 149. I.; Abu.l·Mahasin, II, p. 268, 8. (after Fleischer's
correction, Kleinere SchriJten, II, p. 148) parallel to
THE I;tADITH ITS RELATION TO PARTIES IN ISLAM 121
IX
The group of 1)adiths in which the pious, as it were, mirror the
conditions of the empire (putting into the mouth of the Prophet
their opinions of practices of which they disapprove in order to
invest those conditions with the appearance of events preordained
by God) are closely linked with the political and social circumstances
of the time and grew out of them. The acceptance of the predestined
character of godiess rulers was meant to ease the subjection of the
pious to their might, and it is interesting to see that those who
denied absolute predestination were less ready to admit the justi-
fication of such rulers than were their more fatalistic colleagues.
1
This group completes the series of sayings which we have considered
in their context in the first two, parts of this chapter. The same
circles who teach in mute resignation the duty of loyalty to a hated
government (without following it unconditionally) show a sign of
their consciousness of the decay of Muslim life in 1)arnth form, and
they make the Prophet himself foretell these developments in Islam.
'The beginning of your d,n is prophecy and mercy, then kingship
and mercy (the period of the four caliphs), then a wicked (ajar,
'similar to dust') kingship (the Umayyad period), then kingship and
arrogance;· then wine and silk cloths will be thought permitted.>
The best time Of my comrnuulty is the time when I was sent, then
the period immediately following;' then there comes a people who
press forward to give testimony without being asked for it.' They
promise but do not keep their pledges, they are faithless and cannot
be trusted; obesity will then become general.'" 'How will you behave [126]
in a time when the erulr will be like a lion, the judge like a bald wolf,
the merchant like a growling dog and the true believer will be
amongst them like a frightened sheep in the herd, finding no refuge.
What is the position of the sheep between the lion, the wolf and the
dog?"
Such pictures of the times in traditional form do not strictly
belong to a chapter on political1)arnths; they would best be called
prophetic 1)adiths if we were to find a special name for them. TIlls
1 Ibn Qutayba, ed. Wiistenfeld, p. 225, !4.
:l Mulk wa-jabarut. The worth of the mulk is established by its accompanying
circumstances for the authors of this t.adith.
II Al.Darinll, p. 268.
, In some versions there are repetitions of this sentence.
{; Yashhaduna wa-la yustashhadiina. In Muslim lawitis not permitted to give
testimony or make a judicial oath without having been asked to do so by the
judge; Adab al.Qat/J, fols. 2ob, 29a.
fI Abl1 Daw"O.d, II, p. 172=al-Tirmidhi, II, p. 35.
7 AI.Damirl, II, p. 333. from the Mfzan of al·Dhahabi (Anas b. Malik)
[M{zan, no. 371, s. v. A4mad b. Zurana.]
type of tradition blossomed exuberantly in the system of !;tamth.
Not only the general circumstances of the empire are forecast in
prophetic !;tamths, but even minor details of no general importance
have, post eventum, been turned into predictions by the Prophet.
That one of the Prophet's wives once got barked at by dogs near the
spring of !:law'ab is handed down a prediction by the Prophet,
in order to create a bad omen for 'A'isha's campaign against 'All.
She is said to have remembered the Prophet's words when she met
with the predicted experience at !:law'ab on her journey to B...ra:
'May you not be amongst those whom the dogs at !:law'ab bark at.'
Shrite authorities do not neglect to weave this detail into their
story of the 'Battle of the Camel'.'
The traditionalists do not restrain themselves at all when they
make the Prophet speak about the general development of the Is-
lamic empire. Muhammed foretells the future extension of the rule
of the true believers, their victorious campaign against the Greek
empire, and how 'the Greeks will stand before the brown men (the
Arabs) in troops in white garments and with shorn heads, being
forced to do all that they are ordered, whereas that country is now
inhabited by people in whose eyes you rank lower than a monkey on
the haunches of a camel. '2 The Prophet reveals the future conquest
of the Yemen, of the Maghrib and all the East with three strokes
of the axe during the preparations for the 'battle of the ditches'.
3
Abu Hurayra, who witnessed a great part of the conquests of the
'followers' of the Prophet, is made to give expression to the feeling:
[127] 'You may conquer whatever you wish. But I swear by him who
holds sway over the soul of Abu Hurayra that you will conquer no
city and will conquer none to the day of resurrection without that
Allah has given its keys into the hand of the Prophet before."
Such prophetic sayingsare not only to be found in traditions
excluded from general recognition; even in strict collections of
traditions' a large number of prophecies about the future of the
Islamic empire are recounted. The fight against the Greek Empire
and the movements which led to the passing of the empire's rule to
the 'Abbiisid family are indicated fairly openly. The collection of
Abu Dawiid goes furthest in its chapters al-Fitan, al-Maliil;!im,
1 AI.Ya'qilbi. II, p. 210; p. 105; cf. Yaq'Clt, II, p. 353.
l'. Yaqut. Ill, pp. 242f.
8 Another version in Waqidi (ed. Wellhausen) p. 194.
, Ibn Hisham, p. 673.
SWe have seen in Part I, p. 270 that the Turks are referred to; cf. Abu
Dawud II, p. 137, where they are called B. Qantflra. It might be added that
warning against Turks and Ethiopians is united in one saying, ibid., and al-
Nasa'i, II, p. 12: da'u'l-Qabasha ma wada'ukum mii tara-
kukum. Turk wa·QiibUl (d. YaqUt, IV, p. 221, 10) in the poem asc-ribed to AbU
'fa-lib (Ibn Hisham, p. 174,6).
122 VOLUME TWO: CHAPTER 3 THE I;IADITH ITS RELATION TO PARTIES IN ISLAM 123
al-Mahtli,1 al-Tirmidhi is a little more moderate.' The affairs of
state, revolutions and movements within the empire right up to
the third century are forecast in apocalyptic prophetical form,
resulting in puzzles of interpretation which occupied Muslim com-
mentators very deeply. Occasionally the prophecies are clearer and
more manifest in these traditions, so that one can hardly fail to
recognize the references. It needs little wit to recognize the founda-
tion of 'Abbasid rule when the Prophet makes 'black flags move near
from Khuriisiin, which cannot be resisted until they are planted in
Ilia' (Jerusalem)."
!:ludhayfa b. al-Yaman a zealous champion of the 'Alid cause,'
of whom it is also said in the that the Prophet had entrusted
himwith the secrets of the future,
6
is the companion who was thought
to be most suited as the'carrier' of such prophecies. Even more than
making him tell these openly, he was made (putting on a cloud of
deep mystery) to hint at them discreetly or keep completely silent
about them. 'The Prophet', so he says, 'did not fail to mention one
single leader of rebellions, he named three hundred chieftains who
will appear up to the end of the world qnite specifically by quoting [128]
their names and those of their fathers and their tribal affiliations.'
The prophecies are permeated by chiliastic tendencies.' 'Ali, too,
was often chosen as bearer of such prophecies.
7
He named a Irian
from Transoxiana (rajul min warii' ai-4tahr) called al-:F.Iarith b.
!:lurath, who together with his, general was to play a
messianic part.' Another ruler who is named J ahjah, a man of the
mawiili, who will usurp the leadership at the end of days.
9
A special branch of prophetic traditions consists of the large num-
ber of !;tamths which grew up quite freely and unrestrainedly out of
the local patriotism of the inhabitants of various regions, countries
or cities. They are the expression of the enthusiasm of particular
circles for their own homeland in an Islam spread over two contin-
ents, fictions through which they wanted to show the special im-
portance of their own communities in Islamic life. The circumstances
under Umayyad rule were particularly snited-as we saw before
(pp. 45--6)-to make Syria favoured by the !;tadiths. 'Syria is the
favourite country of Allah and He sends those of His servants there
whom He prefers to all others. 0 confessors of Islam, press forward
1 Abfl Dawfid, II, pp. IS0-4I,
t Tirmidhi, II, pp. 2Jff.
• Ibid., p. 44.
• AI-Ma.'MI, IV, p. 364.
Ii In TakdMb, pp. 200, 14; 20I, 2 ff; cf. aJ-TirmidhI, II, p. 42; Ski/ii, I, p. 282.
IS Abfl Da:wild II, p. I42, calls the period of 500 years half a day (n4!yaum).
'1 Cf.al-Ya'qflbi, II. pp. 225, 3 from the bottom; 357, 2.
8 Abfl Daw'Dd, II, p. I35 uIt; cf. Ibn Khaldfin, Muqaaclima, p. 262, IO.
t AI-Tirmidb!, II, p. 36.
124 VOLUME TWO: CHAPTER 3
towards Syria because God has chosen this country as His favourite
amongst the countries of the whole world" is one of the many
Syrian local traditions which the inhabitants of tIDS country in-
vented to further the fame of their new home. They were meant as
counter-weights to the self-importance of the holy Arab cities and
to show the Muslims living there that there were other areas apart
from J:lijaz favoured and elected by Allah, and that they were on
sacred ground and need not feel worse in the shades of Lebanon than
their brothers in the shadow of 'Arafa or Abu Qubays. There are few
Islamic centres where such local traditions did not develop' and one
need only look through these works of geographic literature whose
authors had theological interests (e.g. Ibn al-Faqih, al-Muqaddas!,
[129] Yaqut) in order to find many scores of examples. This type of local
tradition blossomed particularly in cities which were also centres of
theological activity. It is not astonishing that the pious of Ba.!ira,
in their jealousy of rival schools, let their home town be glorified
by the Prophet in many extravagant sayings. 'Ali, on his withdrawal
to Ba.!ira after the 'battle of the camel', is made to address me
inhabitants with a speech in which he referred to the following
saying of the Prophet: 'An area named Ba.!ira will be conquered.
This place amongst all places on earth possesses the most regular
qibla; the best readers of the Koran are to be found there as well
as men most distinguished in the fear of God, the scholars of Ba.!ira
are the most learned of men and the inhabitants are the foremost
in charity. Four miles from this city is a place called Ubulla, etc:'
The later critic of traditions Ibn al-Jawz! did not, by rejecting ana-
chronistic traditions in which the Prophet refers to the city which
was only founded under 'Umar, destroy belief in them.' Likewise
the mention of the minaret of the Umayyad mosque in Damascus
only strengthened the belief in Muhammed's prophetic gifts without
arousing suspicion of the boldness of the traditionalists.'
Wherever Muslim theologians founded their centres of learning,
they simultaneously produced traditional documents for their
excellence and religious vocation. This endeavour runs parallel
with that which aims at connections between the indigenous popula-
tion rooted in paganism and the ancestors of the first founders of
Islam. We have already seen how such attempts were made by them
in African Islam.' We shall quote some examples here where the same
circles set to work to fabricate traditional evidence for religious
1 Yaqiit, III, p. 242.
2 I refer to the Egyptian examples in Abii'l-Mahasin, I, pp. 30-5.
a Yaqiit, I, p. 646; d. al.J:Iariri'slast Maqama, ed. de Sacy, 2nd ed., p. 673.
(, 'wI, commentary to Abft Dawild, p. I84.
'Ibid, p. 186.
e: Part r, p. I34, further examples in ZVS, XVIII, p. 8x.
THE ITS RELATION TO PARTIES IN ISLAM 125
missions of specific areas. In the book of Darras b. Isma'il (d. 362
in Fez)-a glorifier of Fez tells us in 726-the following account was
found in his own writing: 'Abu Mu<;[ar in Alexandria told me in the
name of Mu1;lammad b. Ibrahim al-Mawwaz, from 'Abd al-RaJ:unan
b. Qasim, from Malik b. Anas, from Ibn Shihab al-Zuhri, from Sa'id
b. al-Musayyib, from Abu Hurayra. He said the Propbet of God
said: "There will one day be a city iu the Maghrib which will be [1801
called Fas, and amongst all the cities in this part of the world it will
have the most correct qibla (i.e. the same as the people of Ba.!ira
claim for themselves in respect of the East) and the inhabitants of
this city will be the most diligent of all the people of the Maghrib
as regards prayer, they will be followers of the sunna and the
orthodox church and they will walk in the path of righteousness
without fail. No enemy will be able to harm them and God will keep
from them what they dislike:'"
The town of Ceuta boasts a similar tradition. In the year 400 A.H.
the inhabitants of mis city were told by Abu 'Abd Allah Mu!).arnmad
b. 'Ali in the name of Wahb b. Masarra, from Ibn Waddal,J., from
from Abu'-l-Qasim, from Malik, from Naft', from Ibn 'Umar,
that the last-mentioned had heard the Prophet say: 'In the furthest
West there is a town called Sabta which was founded by a pious man
named Sabt, of the descendants of Sem, son of Niil,I. He named the
city thus after his own name and prayed for its blessing and fame.
Nobody with bad intentions can approach this city without God
turning IDS wickedness upon h1mself: A credulous theologian in
order to authenticate this saying adds to the above chain the
experience centuries old which is said to verify Muhammed's
prophecy.- No locality considers itself too small or insiguificant to
include itself in the Prophet's clairvoyance, and in order to gain an
impression of the ease with which such local tradition arose it is
enough to look at the goodly number of well-attested sayings which,
Rene Basset quotes (textually and in translation) in IDS work on
the language of the Mana.ir Berbers' in respect of the unimportant
place Shershe1in Algeria.
The village Qamuniyya, called JlKpa. Jlp.p.wvos in Strabo, wIDch
is to the south of Qayruwan, boasts a saying of the Prophet whereby
it includes one of the doors to paradise. If at the end of days the
war against unbelievers will be neglected in other parts of the world,
it will yet continue here; 'And it is as if 1', says the Prophet, 'heard
the call of armies who hurry towards Qamiiniyya from dawn to
dusk.'4
1 Annales regum Mauritaniae, ed. Tornberg, I, p. 18.
2 K. al-Bayan aZ.Mughri.b. ed. Dozy, I, p. 210.
3 'Notes de lexicographie berbere,' lA, 1884. II, pp. 524-26.
4 De Goeje. AI-Ja</ffibii Descriptio al-Magreb£, p. 76.
[131] CHAPTER FOUR
REACTION AGAINST THE
FABRICATION OF l;IADiTHS
I
'ABD Allah b. Lahi'a (d. 174) tells of a converted heretic
'
who
pointed out to him that he must be careful when taking over 1).adiths
because 'when we advanced one of our opinions, we used to give it
the form of a 1).adith.'2
The previous sections have shown that this confession corresponds
to the truth. Every stream and counter-stream of thought in Islam
has found its expression in the form of a 1).adith, and there is no
difference in this respect between the various contrasting opinions
in whatever field. What we learnt about political parties holds true
too for differences regarding religious law, dogmatic points of differ-
ence etc. Every ra'y or hawa, every sunna and bid'a has sought and
found expression in the form of a 1).adith.
3
[132] A time had to come when a reaction, whether religious or ration-
alistic, would set in. In this chapter we shall discuss the signs and
expressions of this reaction. It shows in three different ways.
1. The simplest means by which honest men sought to combat the
rapid increase of faked 1).adiths is at the same time a most remarkable
1 Rajul min ahI al·bida', in another version: min al.khawarij.
:>. Al.Khatibal·Baghd1idi, fol. 53 b, [ed. Hyderabad, p. 123:] idhiira'aynara'yan
ja' alnahu lIadUhan (another version: idhii hawayna amran iayyarnahu J;adUhan).
8 This point of view has in recent times been taken up by rationalist Muslim
apologists. Moulavi Cheragh Ali writes: 'The vast flood of traditions soon
formed a chaotic sea. Truth and error, fact and fable, mingled together in an
undistinguishable confusion. Every religious, social and political system was
defended. when necessary. to please a khalii or an Ameer to serve his purpose
by an appeal to some oral traditions. The name of Mohammed was abused
to support all manner of lies and absurdities, or to satisfy the passion, caprice,
or arbitrary will of the despots. leaving out of consideration the creation of
any standards of test.' And when he is going to quote a number of 1;ladlths
about a given question he reserves his position in the following words: 'I am
seldom inclined tp quote traditions, having little or no belief in their genuine-
ness, as generally they are unauthentic, unsupported and one-sided but etc.'
The proposed legal. political and social reforms in the Ottoman empi.,8 ana athe.,
Mohammadan states (Borobay, r883). pp. xix and I47.
REACTION AGAINST THE FABRICATION OF J;iADITHS I27
phenomenon in the history of literature. With pious intention
fabrications were combated with new fabrications, with new hadiths
which were smuggled in and in which the invention of illegitimate
1).adiths were condemned by strong words uttered by the Prophet.
Sayings of the Prophet are invented which forbid and revile in
harsh words all kinds of falsification and fabrication of 1).adiths, as
well as the falsifying and interpolation of old texts recognized as
authentic.
The most widely spread polemical 1).adith of this nature is the
saying which survives in many versions: man kadhaba 'alayya muta-
ammidan
1
fal-yatabawwa t magt adahu mina'l-niir, 2 'Man who lies
wilfully in regard to me enters his resting place in the fires of hell.'3
About eighty companions"-not counting some paraphrases'-:-
hand down this saying, which is recognizable as a reaction against
the increasing forgery of prophetic sayings. Its attribution to the
authority of the companions--e.g. of 'Uthman-does not however
prove the age of the saying to the extent Muir wishes to infer from [133]
it. •
'In the later days of my community' there will be people who will
hand you communications which neither you nor your forefathers
have ever heard. Beware ofthem.'
'At the end of time there will be forgers,' liars who will bring you
!).adiths which neither you nor your forefathers have heard. Beware
of them so that they may not lead you astray and into temptation.'
Further sayings and warnings of this kind were not referred back
1 The word muta\ammidan is missing in some versions; its omission was
probably intended to protect people who spread and repeat spurious traditions
in good faith. believing them to be correct. This purpose was rather served by
adding the word.
2 Cf. B. lVlagkiizi, no. 8, towards the end, about the unbelievers who fell near
Badr. Mna tabawwa'il maqa'idakutn min at·nar.
30 Muslim, introduction, I, pp. 34tI.;' Abet Dawild, II. p. 81; al-Tirmidhi, II.
p. no; Ibn Maja. p. 5. (line 4: doubts about the word muta'ammidan); al-
Darimi, pp. 42-43, 77; in all these passages there are other sayings with
similar tendency and also the condemnation of traditions light-heartedly
spread: bi-basbi'l-mar'i min al-kadkb an yu1;additka bi-kulli ma sami'a.
, AI-Sam'ani (d. 510) could teU this (QadUh man kadkaba) in 'more than
ninety ways: Tab.1;luff. XV, no. 36.
Ii I will mention only one: man taqawwala •alayya ma lam aqul fal-yatabawwa'
bayna'aynay fahannama maq'adan, in al.KhatIb aI-Baghdad.!, fo1. S6b red.
Hyderabad. p. 200.]
8 Makamet, I, p. xxxvii.
7 Pi iikkir ummati.
IS Dajjalun. This expression is especially applied to forgers of the traditions:
e.g. Yaqat, II, p. I39, says of an AbO. 'Ali al-Tamimi from Herat that he
handed down on the authority of Sufyan, Wald' and others thousands of
which they had never uttered; 'He is an arch·liar (a[md arkan al-kaahb).
one of the dajjii.ls (daHaJ min al-dajajila); he must be mentioned for no other
purpose but to expose him, to attack him and to warn against him.'
to the Prophet himself but were handed down as maxims by pious
men of the first and second centuries:
'Satan'-so runs one of them-'takes human -shape, comes
amongst the people and gives them false J.>amths. The hearers then
scatter and one says later: I have heard a man whom I know by
sight but not by name and who told us J.>adiths.'
'There are claimed devils in the sea, whom Sulaymao b. DaW11d
has exiled there and it is easily possible that they break loose and
recite a (false) Koran to men.'l
The Prophet was also made to have had premonitions of the
falsification and accommodating interpolation of sentences acknow-
ledged as authentic: 'This science during future generations will be
in the hands of its most reliable representatives, who will protect
it from the perversion of heretics, from usurpation by liars and from
interpolation by ignorant people." Thus the reaction of orthodox
critics of tradition against tendentious interference is here foretold.
II
2. The admonitions just mentioned sprang up in those circles who
indulged in fabrication of J.>amths and their circulation but who
sought to judge such activities according to whether the falsification
was in the service of orthodox religion (when it was justified) or was
due to the wish to combat orthodoxy and oppose its suppositions
(e.g. 'Alid propaganda).
Freer thinkers did not take such distinctions and the considera-
tions connected with them into account. Their reaction was not
confined to a particular part of the luxuriously growing J.>adith
(that which appeared inconvenient to the orthodox church), but to
the whole of the system of traditions. The solemn demeanour with
which traditionists pretended to observe the minutiae of the isniia
and the text even when it was quite clear to even superficial observa-
tion (if it was not daunted by the hypocrisy of the 'carriers') that
there could be no question of authenticity, soon aroused sarcasm and
derision from men who were little sulted to admire those vessels
of 'science'. It may be said that an unprejudiced and even ironical
view of persons and things which impressed the common people
because of their religious nature was nowhere more usual than
amongst the belletrists of the Islamic world of the second and third
centures. The holiest of holy is ridiculed and blasphemed here, and
there is little of the fanatical atmosphere which is usually attributed
to Muslim society. In these circles the study of traditions was also
made the butt of ridicule. Light-hearted poets chose the form of
1 Muslim, I, pp. 41££.
Z Introduction to al-Darimi.
[134]
Iz8 VOLUME TWO: CHAPTER 4 REACTION AGAINST THE FABRICATION OF J!:ADITHS IZ9
traditions
l
for frivolous and obscene ideas-MuJ.>ammad b. Munadhir
(d. 200) offers a classical example of this;2 on another occasion the
concept of the isniia is made-by IsJ.>aq al-Maw!;ili-the object of
witticism through a witty allusion to the word mursaliit (Sura 77:I);'
and the height of this tendency is found in a poem inserted in the
tale of Aladdin in which a rude joke is introduced by the preface:'
'baaaathana 'an ba'q. ashyakhihi Aba Bilal shaykunii 'an Shar,k:
Such products would not have arisen or been tolerated in circles in
which the J.>adith was honoured.
5
Contemporary philosophers used more serious forms for the
disparagement of the authorities of tradition.
6
They had no difficulty
in proving for how many contrasting dogmatic and legal theses the
authority of tradition had to serve as a prop; how the J.>adiths express
opinions condemned by the more refined religious concept, whic1l had
gained prevalence even in Islam (e.g. the anthropomorphic presenta-
tion of divine attributes etc.) The fantastic fables with which
tradition embroidered biblical legends as well as the first beginnings
of eschatology in the Koran, were cited with relish. In order to
disparage the J.>adiths, those passages were exploited in whichpopular
legend and superstition (khuriijiit) were recorded and incorporated
in religious belief as communications ·of the Prophet.
7
The minutely
detailed instructions which the tradition contains for the most
intimate relations of everyday life were held up to ridicule, etc. The
urge to jeer at this last point is referred to in the J.>adith itself; the
pagan contemporaries of Muhammed are made to remark slightingly
about this law: 'Your comrade (Muhammed) teaches you how to
relieve yourselves:' What is here put into the mouth of the Prophet's
time probably reflects the opinion of the free-thinking men of later
times, to whom it seemed of dubious propriety to make detailed rules
1 Ibn Rashiq (d. 463) uses the isnfid form quite differently for poetical pur.
poses in a poem quoted by Mehren. Rhetorik dey Araber p. 101, 4.
, Agh., XVII, p.•8.
3 Ibid., V, p. lIO.
... Arabian Nights, ed. B'O.1a.q, 1279. II, p. 95, top.
S [One must, however, remember that making fun of holy things does not
necessarily imply lack of belief in them.]
G I presume that in the warning ascribed to Mu'a.dh b. Jabal in Abo. DawO:d.
II, p. 169. there is a scarcely veiled attack against the philosophers' attitude
towards the traditions: 'I warn you of clever speeches by the wise (zayghat
al-ZtaMm) since Satan often speaks heretical thoughts through the mouth of
the wise.'
'In a!·Jal;liz, K. al·ijayawan (Vienna, MS.), fols. 53bff. [IV., pp.•86ff.]
such hadiths are ridiculed.
8 Ai-Nasa'i, I, p. 6: qiila'Z.mushrikana. inna naYa $abibakum yu'allimukumu'l.
kharu.' ata; Abe. DawtLd, I, p. 3; ai-TirmidhI, p. 5; qUa liSalmana qad 'allamakum
nabiyyukum, etc. In A.D. the addition is characteristic: 'I am to you as a
father to his children, I teach you
[135]
130 VOLUME TWO: CHAPTER 4
for the smallest occurrences of everyday life issue from the mouth of
the Prophet and to invest these with religiously obligatory authority.
Amongst the sayings belonging to this group which in the frame-
work of tradition show polemics against those free-thinking men
who, since as Muslims they had to accept the law, professed to
adhere only to the Koran and attempted to reject everything that
under the name of !).aclith or sunna claimed the same normative
[1361 authority for the everyday behaviour of men, one attracts our
special attention. It shows the point of view of the rejecting opposi-
tion and on the other hand the attitude of orthodox adherents of the
sunna. The Prophet said: 'It could happen that someone hears of
my !).aclith and would make himself comfortable iu his resting place
saying: Between you and us is the book of God; what is permitted
therein we accept as permitted and what is forbidden we consider
forbidden.' Verily, what the Prophet has forbidden we consider
forbidden as if God Himself had forbidden ito'- As examples for this
latter remark some dietary laws are mentioned in the !).adith
(forbidden species of animals are quoted) which are not spoken of in
the Koran. Thisutterance has also been invested with a humanitarian
sentiment, since it was quoted to the cruel commander of captured
Khaybar who committed all manner of cruelties towards the con-
quered inhabitants. 'Does one of you who are comfortable in your
seat of rest believe that God ouly forbids things mentioned in the
Koran? Verily, by God, I have given orders, exhortations and inter-
dictions which count as much as the Koran if not more. Verily,
God does not permit you to break into the houses of Jews without
permission, that you maltreat their women and eat their fruit if
they fulfil their obligations:>
In the second century attacks by heretic circles against tradition
were fairly widespread. Ibn al-QaWin (d. Ig8) could say that there
was no heretic in the world who did not attack the followers of
tradition (laysa ft'l-dunyii mubtaai' illii wa-huwa yabghuau ahl al-
1;adUh.' From a refutation of their arguments by Ibn Qutayba (d.
27
6
) we can see clearly what the philosophers al-kaUm)
objected to in the !).aclith, and we can also observe how far the pole-
mics of freer thinkers against this overwhelming element of theo-
logical life had grown already in the third century. Ibn Qutayba
endeavours in his work MukhtaliJ al-IfaaUh to refute all these ob-
jections from the standpoint of orthodOX Muslims, but he is forced
to use all manner of forced interpretations in order to lend some
sense to the absurdities and silinesses, have recourse to parallels
1 Abo: Dawlid, II, p. 169.
S AI-Tirmidhi, II, p. III.
s Abl1. Dawftd. II, p. 31.
.. Introduction to aI-DarimI.
-;.-
REACTION AGAINST THE FABRICATION OF Jj:ADITHS l3I
in the Old and New Testament, and make concessions to limit the
credibility and authority of the traditions. He often quite freely [1371
admits in this book that the traditions ridiculed are not credible.'
Notorious fables he attributes to the and to Jewish sources,
and expresses regret that the Muslims had entrusted themselves to
such guidance.- This influence of the Jewish Agada and Christian
legend is attested with regret by orthodox theologians> from the
times of Islam up to later periods. Even in early times the
tradlllons express this feeling. 'Umar is made to ask the Prophet:
'We hear several tales from the Jews which we like, may we write
some of them down?' Whereupon the Prophet is made to reply:
'Do you wish to rush to perdition as did the Jews and Christians?
I have brought you white and clean hadiths-'. • The warning against
the a1;liaith muJta'ala of the Ahl al-Kitab then took root in later
theology from this inspiration.
5
Philosophical mockery at the authority of tradition also took
!,oetic.al form. Ibn Qutayba has preserved for us such an epigram,'
III which the fact that bearers of traditions often have no under-
standing of the text handed down by them is ridiculed. It runs: 7
Zawlimilu U'I-ash'liri' la'ilma'indahum{bi-jayyirlihii illii ka'ilmi'l-
aba1iri
1 In MukhtaZiJ aZ-IjadUh, p. 378, he cites e.g. the words of Hisham b. 'Urvva
against MuJ;LaDlmad b. Is:Qaq who handed down traditions from Fatima, the
wife of Hisham: <Has my wife given him company?' Against the same Mu:Q_a.m-
mad he quoted the judgement of Mu'tamir whom his father warned of the liar
Mul;!.. b. IsQ.. ibid, p. 92, he mentions that the tradition experienced many
sectarianinterpolations, etc.
, Ibid, pp. 336ff.
a al- Ja1:Li.'? (Bayiin, fol. 74a, [II, p. IIS]) quotes the saying of an Ar_ab:
lJ,add1.th Ba-n7- Isrii'f.Z wa,·la lJ,araj. The same saying is quoted as a l;ladith
by Abu Dawud, II, p. 82, al-Tirmidhi, II, p. III, in a. different context from
that in al· [Cf.•Iso .J·Kh'lib Taqy'd, I, pp. 30-I, 34: Goldziher, in
REj. 1902, p. 64, Richtungen, p. 58; G. Vajda. 'Juifs et musulmans selon Ie
h.dit',]A, '937, p·1I7·1
al·Sunna. T, p. 14. A tradition which takes an intermediate
position and advises acceptance of the truth of the ab.iidlth ahl al·kitiib and
rejection of the lies is in Aho. Dawftd, II, p. 81.
i Cf. al.Qas\:alHini, V, p. 665. [Cf. for the subject also Goldziher, quoted in
note 3: Vajda, op. cit. pp. II5:ff.] I
II MukhtaUf al.l;Iadlth, p. 9.
7. The poem is by ;Marwan b. Abi I;Iafijla (d. 18I{2) and refers to people who
recIte old poems WIthOut understanding their sense, al,Suyfiti Muzhir, II.
p. 161, bottom.
s In a marginal note whose writer presumably did not know the source of
the citation this is corrected to li'l·as{an with reference to the passage in the
Sura yabmilu asfaran). The simile of the pack
carrymg books :s frequent in oriental poetry :for the description of
stenle learnmg, e.g. VIII. no. 3, ed. Gladwin. p. 209, bottom, about
the four-footed animal which has been loaded with books.
I32 VOLUME TWO: CHAPTER 4
La'amruka mii yadri'l-maliyyu
'
idM ghadalbi-aJ;omiiiihi
2
aw riiJ;oa
mliji'l-gharii'iri.
[138] 'Pack camels laden with poems, they know no more what is
excellent in them than do camels;
As sure as you live, the pack animal does not know while carrying
its load early or late what are the contents of its load:
Another anonymous poem which appears to belong to the same
group of ideas provides a parallel to this epigram:
Inna'l-ruwiita bilii fahmin limii J;oaji;u/mithlu'l-jimiiii 'alayhii
yuJ;omalu'l-wada'u
Lii'l-wad'a yanfa'uhu J;oamlu'l-jimiiii lahulwa-lii'l-jimiilu bi' J;oamii',-
wad'i tantafi'u
Traditionalists without understanding of what they preserve are
like camels who are loaded with shells;
It is of no use to the shells that they are carried by camels but it
is also of no use to the camels that they carry shells.
s
Abu'l-'Ala' al-Ma'am, the noble enemy of belief in authority,"
censures the weakness of the isniids:
'They bring us 1;ladiths which reason does not verify, so we ask:
who are the people on whose authority you recount them?
Then they refer to their false isniids which are not free from
mention of a sheikh whom they themselves do not praise:'
Such remarks left their trace on Muslims faithful to the sunna."
It is against such people as the poet just mentioned and his kind
that Abii'Abd Allah Mul;lammad b. I-l;lumaydl (d. 488) wrote
his qa$lda: ji'l-naqi!i 'alii man dhamma (or'iiba)'l-J;oadltha wa-ahlahu,
'to refute one (or "those") who scorned the 1;ladith and its followers:
1 Muzhir: ba'iru.
t Ibid: bi-awsaqiki.
:I AI-Damiri, II, p. 462 (s.v. al-wad').
4. 'Be a servant of God but not a servant of His servants (men): the law
makes slaves, independent thinking frees,' Kremer, ObeY die Philosophiscken
Gedichte des Abul 'Alii Ma'arry (Vienna. 1888), p. 96, on p. 126 [Luzamiyyat,
Cairo, 1831, I, p. 326.]
Ii Ibid, p. 103, on p. 266 [Cairo. 183I. ii. p. 346].
(I [For adversaries of the 1).adith d. also Goldziher, ZDlVIG. LXI, pp. 860ff.,
1St. III, pp. 230fI.; Schacht, Origins of Muh. jurispr" pp. 40ff.]
REACTION AGAINST THE FABRICATION OF J!:ADITHS I33
III
3. The most enduring result was achieved by that form of reaction
which arose in the circle of the traditionists themselves against the
overwhelming growth of traditions and manifested itself in the
development of a kind of criticismof true tradition.
It has already been pointed out (above, p. 56) that the pious
community was ready with great credulity to believe anything that
they encountered as a traditional saying of the Prophet. Doubts as
to the authenticity of parts of the collected material were easily
quelled. The theologians themselves appear to have extended the [139]
theory of the ijmii' to the credibility of the 1;ladith at an early date
and to have accepted the generalfeeHngof the communityas supreme
judge of the truth of traditional sayings. Ibn 'Abbas is made to say:
'If you hear from me a communication in the name of the Prophet
and you find that it does not agree with the book of God or is not
liked by people (fa-lam tajiduhufi kitiib A lliih aw J;oasanan 'inda'l-niis) ,
knowthat I have reported a lie about the Prophet:
'
In other words:
also in respect of the credibility of words and actions ascribed to the
Prophet the ijmii', the general feeling ofthe community, is deciSive."
What the umma considers to be true is really true. S
Conscientious students of tradition did not allow themselves to be
guided by this easy way of deciding the authenticity of the vast
accumulation of material and, in viewof the dangeI which threatened
the orthodox community from the masses of tendentious 1;ladiths,
they asked for other proof of credibility than the acceptance of the
community.
The immediate impetus for exact assessment of all that reached
the people in the form of 1;ladiths was the circumstance that, through
influential individuals in certain circles of the Islamic world hadiths
hostile to orthodox teaching were spread and recognized' wide
1 p. 77.
II AI-Khatib aI-Baghdadi, fol. uSa, red. Hyderabad, p. 430J puts together
a number of from which it is evident that authenticity or rejection of
the prophetic tradition is made conditional on the impression that it made upon
the community. 'If you hear my name in a communication which is agreeable
to your heart, which makes your hair and flesh tender (ta'rijuhu quZao"ukum
wa-taZinu bini ash'iiYukum wa-abshqrukum) and about which you feel that it is
close to you, then none of you is as close to it as I am. But if you hear a
communication in my name which is against your heart and from which your
hair and flesh shrink and which repels you, then none of you are so far re-
moved from it as I am'; in addition to this, there are other sayings of similar
content.
s Ibn KhaId1i.n expresses concisely this feeling of Muslims in the words:
'The ijma' is the strongest protection and the best defence' (of J:1adiths which
critics dislike): ft'Z-ijma'i a';amu l.imayatin wa-absanu darin, Muqaddima,
p. 260, 4 from the bottom.
134 VOLUME TWO: CHAPTER 4
areas of Islam and, according to the point of view mentioned above,
conld claim the ijmii' in their own favour. It must be remembered
that the trend of the sunna in a province was mainly determined
[140] by those theologians who, at the time when the sunna began to
spread, commanded the trust of the people of that province: !3y
means of the lfadiths that they spread, they influenced the 0plll1on
of the people in whose midst they worked. The inhabitants of Egypt
valued 'Uthman little until al-Layth b. Sa'd (d. 175) spread lfadiths
of 'Uthman's excellences (farJii'i0 amongst them. Similar was the
behaviour of the inhabitants of Hims in respect of 'Ali until Isma'n
b. 'Ayash (d. 181) acquainted them with the lfadiths on farJii'il
'Ali.' 'The people of KUfa,' says Wakl' (d. Ig6), 'would have re-
mained in ignorance of lfadith had not Jabir al-Ju'fi brought
to them.'- We can easily deduce what kind of lfadith developed In
KUfa under Jabir's inspiration from what we know of him already
(above, p. no). .'.
Thus the party affiliations of the transmltters of tradlt10ns
decided whether the masses of the people were to be influenced one
way or another.
There was therefore a real danger of the smuggling in of 1).adiths,
a danger which threatened all fields of the sunna in religion and
public life. Those circles who wished to protect the lfadith from such
falsifications had to pay particular attention to the character of the
authorities and informants on whom the claim of authenticity for
each hadith was based. Only such 1).adiths were to be accepted as
correctly the religious spirit of the whole community as
had been handed on by men whose personal honesty as well as their
attitude to the orthodox confession, were beyond doubt, who were,
in the full meaning of the word, thiqa, 'reliable', and who were not
given to ascribing to the Prophet, from mere thoughtlessness, lack
of religious integrity or from party interests, sayings which
contrary to the general teaching and served thelr own ends. Th,s
point of view dominates the whole of the criticism of tradition as it
developed in Islam. Less attention is paid to the contents of the
tradition itself than to the authorities in the isniid. Belief in the
authenticity of a lfadith stands or falls with their reliability. There-
fore the isniid could be called 'the legs (al-qawii'im) of the 1).adith',
since the right to existence of the utterances handed down rests
[141] upon it and without it they could not be sustained;' or 'the fetters
(qayd) of the l)adith" which alone can i.t together. .
While the danger which threatened traditlons through tendentIOus
1 Al.Damiri (s.v. al-Layth) , II, p. 376. bottom of Uthman b. $a.liJ:) (d.
21
9).
2 AI-Tirmidhf, It p. 44. 8; II, p. 333. penult.
S Muslim. I, p. 46.
.. Agh., V, p. ItO, ult.
REACTION AGAINST THE FABRICATION OF J>ADITHS I35
and thoughtless transmitters was not realized, little weight was
given to the authorities of the isniid (al-rijiil, 'the men').t Even to
Malik b. Anas the practical use is the first consideration and he cares
little about the rijiil.- He takes over and passes on unhesitatingly
1).adiths told by the erotic singer 'Urwa b. Udhayna,' perhaps from
a sympathy with the activity which he himself had indnlged in in
his youth.' Only when the invention of partisan and tendentious
traditions had prevailed did anxious theologians pay closer attention
to the informants of each saying with a view to making the validity
of the l)adith dependent upon their quality.5 It seems to have been
in the time of Ibn 'Awn (d. ISI)', Shu'ba (d. 160),7 Abd Allah b.
Mubarak (d. 181) and others of their contemporaries that criticism
of the authorities begins.' Criticism was strictest in 'Iraq· and fur-
ther east where the religious and political parties were most sharply
opposed and where they used in the shrewdest way temporal and
spiritual means to help their ideas to victory. When in the third
century, because of the systematic collection of 1).adiths, the selection
of correct and objectionable 1).adiths and the rejection of the sus-
picious and false ones becomes a need, criticism of the traditions
becomes an important part of the science of traditions,to whose great
flowering is during the third and fourth centuries. We name two of
the most respected writings of this time which are still extant: the
'Book of the Weak' (Kitiib al-J?u'afii') byal-Nasa'i" (d. 303), whom
we shall meet again as an important collector, and the 'Perfect book [142]
in regard to the recognition of the weak amongst the transmitters'
(al-kiimil fi ma'rifat rJu'afa' al-mutal;addithin) by Ibn 'Adi
(d. 365).12
Each of the informants mentioned in the isniid was investigated in
order to gain insight into their character and to find out whether
1 A1.Darimi, p. 60, bottom.
2 Tahdhib, p. 53I, penult.
S Agh., XXI, p. 162, ult.
• See above, p. 82 note 2.
Muslim, I. p. 44: alMKbapb alMBaghdadi, fol. 3sa [ed. Hyderabad. p. 122]:
l;atta waqa<at al fina, 'the isnaris are not investigated'; from that time one
case was taken li·yu1}aath 1}adUh aki 1}ariUh aM al-bid<a.
GSee above. p. 52.
'1 It is told of him (Tab. J:luff. V, no. 28) that he was the .first to investigate
the character (read amir instead of amilr as in ed. Wiistenfeld) of transmitters
in <Iraq and to reject the unreliable and reprehensible.
S This follows from several utterances of hisin Muslim, pp. 47ft.
t Cf. above, p. 8r. The greater care of the 'Iraqians is also stressed by Ibn
Khaldnn, Muqaddima, p. 369, 3.
10 For the beginnings of this literature see H. Kh., II. p. 591.
II Oxford Ms. Marsham, no. 556; Bod!. Cat., CCCLXXIXno. 2,
pp. 371ff. [GAL I, 171,S I, 270.] ,
" Cairo Cat" I, pp. 129ff. [GAL S I, 280.]
E'
136 VOLUME TWO: CHAPTER 4
they were unobjectionable morally and religiously and whether they
made propaganda for anti-Sunnite purposes,l whether their love
of the truth was generally established, whether they had personally
the ability to repeat correctly what they heard, and whether they
were men whose testimony in civil cases would be admitted by a
judge without hesitation. Transmission of l).adlths was considered
the highest form of the shahiida, bearing witness,' because the
riiwi testimony that one has heard this or that saying from this or
that person concerns matters of extreme importance for the shaping
of religious life. According to the outcome of these investigations,
informants were called thiqa (reliable) mutqin (exact), thabt (strong),
l;tujja (admitted as evidence), 'adl (truthful), l;tiifl; or Ijiib# (who
faithfully keeps and passes on what he has heard). These are the
qualities of the first order. Transmitters of a lower status are qualified
with (saying the truth) 3, ma1;alluhu al-sidq (his position is that
of truth), Iii ba's biM (unobjectionable). Less than these are those
rijiil who are judged with the words al-1;aaith.
4
An even lesser
degree of trust will be shown to those whom the critics can give no
[143] better marks than that they are no liars (ghayr kadhab, lamyakahib).
6
Critics of tradition distinguIsh these grades and the many inter-
mediate gradations between them with great exactitude, and they
circumscribe the theoretical and practical usefulness of traditions
according to whether the informants have been awarded one or the
other grade of reliability.
Such examination was the more important since the result had
great influence on religious practice. According to 'Abd al-Ral).man
b. Mahdl (d. 198) only those are to lead and influence the religious
life of the community who are able to judge the reliability of the
l).adlths, who do not see a 1;ujja, an argument of proof, in every
1 Confession of bida' was not considered in itself as damaging to credibility;
only propaganda for heretic teachings is considered as such. {yaq'D.t, III, p.
464, rS. taught by Ibn Ibn I:Iibban [d. 354] as ijma: al·a'imma}. Qadarites
are frequent in the isnads of most careful collections (e.g. B. Buyu: no. 15.
TiM. no. 26; cf. aI.Qast. to these passages, IV, p. 22, VIII, p. 424). Tab.l;Iuff.,
V, no. 16, read qadariyyan, iii, instead of qailra mao Concerning this question
see notes to Ibn Hisham, p. 159. and Literaturgeschichte der Schi'a, p. 72, note 6.
Some went further in this respect, e.g. a Murgi'ite is declared weak because of
this dogmatic deviation (AI-Tirmidhi, I, p. IIg, 7 ra'a ra'y al·irjii'), and
'Uthman b. Sa'id (d. 280) considered every theologian an unreliable
t'iiwt who professed the creation of the Koran, Abu.'I·Ma];t.asin. II, p. 91, uit.
! Sprenger, lASB, 1856, p. 53, has described this in detail.
S That such a definition does not describe absolute trustworthiness is to be
seen from definitions such as: Jartr b.l;;Iiizimrubbamiiyahimuft shay' wa-nuwa
!jadUtj. al.Tirmidhf, I, p. 103, 14.
'" Cf. aI-Khatib aI-Baghdadi, fo1s. 8a f. red. Hyderabad, p. 22] TaqrEb, fol.
4Sb. [naw 23, trans!.]A, XVII ('9IO), p. '47].
.a; AI.Tirmidhi, r, pp. 57, 3 from below, II3, 14.
REACTION AGAINST THE FABRICATION OF 1;IADITHS I37
transmitted sentence but who know from which sources the 'science'
can be derived (makhiirij' al-'ilm).' Statements about the absolute
or relative reliability and trustworthiness of the informants stand
theref?re in contrast to proofs of their unreliability and untrust-
worthmess. It must be noted that finding fault with the trust-
worthiness of transmitters is called 'wounding' (jarb) in the ter-
minology of this science. A large number of synonyms for this con-
cept are used to express the fact that someone is not recognized
as a correct transffiltter; the most usual one is the verb fa'ana 3
to with ": spear, then qaaa1;a, and more rarely
nazaka, whIch III manuscnpts ,and editions often appears as taraka
because of graphic similarity.5 If the lack of trustworthiness is not
assert:d with certainty but as a suspicion it is cautiously said that
one blinks the eyes about the informant in question (we should say
one turns up the nose).'
Accord!ng to of the investigation the suspect in- [144]
formant IS descnbed Wlth another qualitative term. If SOmeone is
called layyin al-[ladith (tender in respect of the l).adlth) his reliability
has been 'wounded' but not fully disproved. Less credible people
are with the epithet laysa bi-qawi (he is not strong), and
then m descending order: Ija'if (weak), matruk al-1;adith Or tlhiiMb
(whos: left aside, is invalid), khar1r1hiib (liar), etc.7
Cnbcal eXanlmatlOn m order to determine these grades was called
al-jay1; wa'l-ta'dil, i.e. 'the wounding and accrediting'. Its most
important traces are to be found in the glosses to the words of
suna:, _(sec Chapter 8: as to each 1).adlth included in them the jar[l
or ta dII of the transffiltters has been added. Such investigations gave
;ise to the of the ma'rifat al-rijiil, Le. knowledge of
Illformants;' this branch of l).adlth science reached its height with
1 Sing. makhraj; this is the name of the authority which serves as a basis or
support for a usage; note the use of the word in this sense in a story aI. 'lqd
III, p. 9, 2:2, :23. ' ,
, Tahdklb, p. 39', '3.
3 Cf. also kaUama, yaq'O.t, II, p. 158, 9.
... Muslim, in'b"oduction, p. 47, ult! This is less than kadhdhaba to accuse some_
one of being a complete liar, Tab.l;luff, VII, nos. II, 1/.
Thus, e.g.• Ibn Qutayba, ed. Wtistenfeld, p. 221, IS, for inna Shahy
utrukUhu must be read twice, inna ShaMan nazakahu, the same mistake is
found in al.Tirmidhi, I, p. 44, 8; II.. pp. 117, 10; 178, 4, where instead of
tarakahu, tarakuhu must be read nazakahu, na.zakuhu.
e Ghumiza 'alayhi, aI·Tiisi, Shf;'a Books, pp. 162,3,2:23,7. The word giving
tb:
e
reason why .n,oses turned up at the mu7;addith concerned is connected
W1th the prep<:sltlOn bz: e.g. ghamazu 'alayhi bi·la'b al-shatranj, ibid, p. 139.4.
Cf. al·Ghammaz, the htle of a work in which suspect hadiths are criticized
AhIwardt, Ber1. Cat., II, p. 279. . •
7 AI·Khatib aI-Baghdadi, I.e.; TaqrEb, I.e.
• Taqr'b, fo!. 82a. [N.w 6" transl.]A, XVIII (I90I), p. '4
2
.]
138 VOLUME TWO: CHAPTER 4
Ibn Abi l';Iatim ('Abd Allih b. Mul;1ammad b. Imis) from Rayy
(d. 327).1
Apart from examining the personal qualities of transmitters the
critics had to turn their attention also to the inner consistency of the
isniid. Here they were able to find out the strangest things. In one
isniid, for example, 'Abd al-Ral)man b. Abi Layla is mentioned as a
hearer of Mu'adh b. Jabal. But Mu'adh died during 'Vmar's reign
(ca. 17-18) and 'Abd al-Ral)man was only born in the year 17.-
In the face of such experiences it was the critics' task to be on the
lookout for chronological impossibilities in the isniirls of l,1adiths.
If for instance l';Iasan al-Ba>;ri is said to transmit 'an Abi Hurayra,
they had to state that it was not possible chronologically for these
two men to have personal relations with each other.' AI-Bukhari
says of the isniid 'Qabus b. Abi Z;ubyan from his father AbU
(145] Z;ubyan from Salman that this chain cannot be right because Salman
was dead at the time that A.Z;. was able to hear traditions.
4
Such
chronological criticism the forgers attempted to nullify by inter-
polating between the links of the isniid chain, between whom a real
contact could not be proved, any chosen name, invented ad /we:
a majhUl, Le. a totally unknown man. It must therefore also be the
critics' task to pay attention to whether such 'unknown ones' call in
doubt the validity of the isniid.
6
IV
By means of diligent research of this kind the Muslim critics of
tradition succeeded in unmasking many forgers and avoided l,1adiths
connected with their names.
6
The shocks which they had experienced
in the course of their investigations helped to sharpen their eye and
to increase their wariness and scepticism. Facts proved that such
scepticism could never be taken too far if it was to keep abreast with
the boldness of forgers. These latter did in fact do everything which
could be expected in a field from the outset rife with falsifications
of all kinds. To mention but one example for the daring of the
inventors of traditions it may suffice to point out that, apart from
the usual method of attributing spurious sentences to authorities
whose names did in fact figure in the history of Islam, there were
1 yaq'CIt. II, p. 899. I; Tab. lfufi., XI, no. 40, read wa'l·ta'd'll instead of
wa'l·tanwU.
1: AI.Tirroidhi, II, pp. 189. 257, top.
a Tahdhfb, p. 210, top.
4. Al.Tirmidhi. II, p. 328, top.
li An instructive example is in al-Sarakhsi, ShaY!; K. al-Siyal', fo1. 23Sa (the
passage appears to belong to the text); other examples, al-Tirmidhi, II, pp.
153.5. 174. 17, 180, 7 from below.
6 Maslim, introduction, p. 31, mentions a number of notorious forgers whose
must be excluded as a matter of course.
REACTION AGAINST THE FABRICATION OF I;!ADiTHS 139
some people who felt no scruples in inventing entirely new names
with which to dupe credulous listeners. From the same centnry in
which Ibn 'Adi wrote (see p. 135), an Abu 'Amr Liil;tiq b. al-l';Iusayn
(d. 384 in Kharizm) is mentioned who introduced made-
up names in his isniids, such as Tughral and 'firMI and Karkadunn
to whom he attributed traditions.
'
Towards such presumably not
isolated incidences heightened suspicion and careful investigations (146]
by the critics was indicated.- They did not fail-despite all leniency'
- to carry negation as far as it was possible in this field. An example
will show us how far some went in this negative criticism which also
affords deep insight into the mechanics of the formation of Muslim
tradition.
In several sunna works we find a paragraph about the following
legal questions: Someone marries a woman and dies before con-
summating the marriage and without having fixed the $adiiq, the
bride-price needed to make the marriage fully valid. Such a case
came before Ibn Mas'ud, who made this decision: The same price
must be paid to the woman as is normally granted to the women of
this tribe! no more or less;6 the widow also enjoys the (legal) rights
to inheritance from the man's estate, and must observe (before her
re-marriage) the waiting time ('idda,
6
customary for every widow).
'If this judgement is right'-added Ibn Mas'ud-'it is from God, but
if it is wrong it is from me and Shaytan, and Allah and His Prophet
have no part in it: Some man of the tribe of Ashja' then got up,
amongst them al-Jariil,1 and AbU Sinan, and said: 'We testify, 0
Ibn Mas'ud, that the Prophet made the same decision as you when
such a case occurred with us pn account of Barwa" daughter of
Wiishiq, the name of whose husband was Hiliil b. Murra al-Ashja'i:
Ibn Mas'ud expressed deep joy that his judgement coincided with
that olthe Prophet.' In another version he who quotedthe Prophet's (147]
• Yaqut, III, p. 375.
:I In the third century the question was posed whether those transmitters
were also to be considered as forgers who spread authentic sayings of the
Prophet with deliberately enlarged and altered ·isniUs; greatest tolerance was
shown for this kind of falsification, al-Tirmidbi, II, p. :00.
I So as not to be unjust and not to be tempted into condemnation by the
strange sound of the names, lists of odd-sounding names of authorities who
have really existed were compiled. Gotha Cat., Ms. no. 574, ibid, fo1. 4a, a
saying is quoted from AJ;unad b. Yilnus al·Raqqi (227) in respect of the name
of the Kilfan transmitter, Musaddad b. Musarhad b. Musarbal al.AsadI: 'If
this name were preceded by the bismi'lliih it would be suitable as an incantation
against scorpions'; Ibn Maja, p. 8,3: law quri'a hiidhii'Z-isnfldu 'alii majnunin
la-bara'a.
40 Ka'jadiiq nisii'ihll, I can only relate the fem. suffix to the tribe.
Ii Lii waks (d. N51deke. Beitr. Poesie, p. 189, v. 7.) wa-Ia. (c!. Agh.,
V, p. 134, 14: fa'shtatta 'alayhi bi'l.mahr).
11 Silra 2 :234f.
1 AbO. Dawild, T, pp. 209-IO; al-TirmidhI, I, p. 2q.
[148]
140 VOLUME TWO: CHAPTER 4
judgement is called Ma'qil b. Sinan; he said: 'I have heard when the
Prophet gave this judgement in respect of Barwa' bint Washiq.'
This is an example for the phenomenon when originally a l,Jadith
was subsequently quoted for a judgement which was based upon
mdependent reasoning (ra'y)." The judgement of Ibn Mas'lid, as
well as the l,Jadith testifying to it, are the product oflater theologians;
otherwise it would be inexplicable that in the second century differ-
ent opinions should have arisen about this casuistic legal case and
that the woman's right to the $adiiq" should have been questioned
(e.g. by al-Shafi'i). In his criticism of this tradition 'Uthman b.
Sa'id al-Darmi (d. 280), a pupil of Yal,lya b. Mu'in and Al,Jmad b.
I;Ianbal, goes so far as to say: 'Allah never created a Ma'qil b.
Sinan, and a Barwa' bint Washiq also never existed." In respect of
Ma'qil he seems to have overshot the mark, as his existence can
hardly be denied' even if his relationship to this legal case is an
invention of the theologians. Al-Darimi was not the first to dare to
deny the existence of persons who figure as historical people in
Muslim reports. A century before him Malik b. Anas had had the
courage to say that Uways al-Qarani, whom later generations have
given the titleSayyid at-tiibi'in' and whose person was adorned with
religious legends (and prophecies of Muhammed),' did not exist.
7
v
The point of view of Islamic criticism of the traditions, despite
examples of individual objectivity, was able to exclude only part of
the most obvious falsifications from the l,Jadith material. Muslim
criticism had chiefly formal points of departure.
8
It is mainly formal
points which are decisive for judgement about credibility and
authenticity or, as Muslims say, 'health'. Traditions are ouly
investigated in respect of their outward form and judgement of the
value of the contents depends on the judgement of the correctness
of the isnaa. If the isniid to which an impossible sentence full of
inner and outer contradictions is appended withstands the scrutiny
of this formal criticism, if the continuity of the entirely trustworthy
1 See above, p. 80.
Z In al-Tirmidhi, I, p. 214.
, Tahdhlb, p. 567, IS.
4 Ibn Durayd, p. 168, 12; d. al.'Iqd, II, p. 312.
I'; Abu'l.Mal1asin. I, p. 127, 3 from below.
13 al.$unna, II, p. 210. [Cf. also Ibn Sa'd, VI, pp. IlIff, Abfi Nu'aym
al.I-?fahanl, Hilyat al·Awliyii', II, pp. 79:ff, aI.Khatib, Ta'yf,kh, III, p. ISff,
al.Dhababi, l11izan al.I'tidiil, no. 1024.]
7 Ibn 1;3:ajar. I, no. 496. [Cf. also aI-Khatib I.e., and al.Dhahabi, I.e.]
8 Cf. Muir, Mahomet, I, p. xliv; Dozy, Essai sm' l'Mstoire de l'[slamisme,
transl. V. Chauvin, p. 1:23.
REACTION AGAINST THE FABRICATION OF I;lADITHS '4
I
authors cited in them is complete and if the possibility of their
personal communication is established, the tradition is accepted as
worthy of credit. Nobody is allowed to say: 'because the matn
contains a logical or historical absurdity I doubt the correctness of
the isniid.' And if under correct isniids contradictory traditions are
handed down, there begins-if it is not possible toimpuguthecorrect-
ness of one isnad in favour of the other-the work of a subtle har-
monistic,
"
which often extends to the smallest details." If the con-
tents cannot be reconciled at all an attempt is made-where legal
traditions are concerned-to achieve this by the theory of niisikh
wa-mansiikh (abrogation)' or mere formal principles are stated
which-as it is expressed-are destined to heal 'the illnesses of the
l,Jadith ('itat alr1;adith). It is for instance a principle of tradition
criticism to give preference, in case of a conflict of two traditional
accounts, one of which is affirmative, the other negative, to the
affirmative rather than the negative one. When, e.g., Bilal reports
that the Prophet prayed at the Ka'ba, whereas a tradition attributed
to Ibn 'Abbas denies this fact, and both reports fulfil the conditions
of a correct isniid, Muslim criticism decided by this principle that the
affirmative report of Bilal is credible (innamii yu'khadh bi-shahiidat
aZ-muthbit iii bi-shahiidat a'l-niifi)· ' -
Muslim critics have no feeling for even the crudest anachronisms [149]
provided that the isniid is correct. Muhanlmed's prophetic gift is
used as a factor to smooth over such difficulties. The Prophet is for
example made to assign the places at which pilgrims coming to
Mecca from various parts of the Islamic world have to begin the
taht.l (the crymg of tabbayka). Even the scrupulous versions here
think of pilgrims from Syria, but there are also versions which-
in Muhammed's time-already made provisions for the 'Iraq
pilgnn; ca;avans; and the critics, who do not admit this latter part
as havrng Issued from the Prophet, have beeilled to this not because
of the anachronism implied but because of the difficulties of the
isnfid.
5
1 Cf. above, p. 86.
! Thus, e.g., to solve the minor contrast between B. no. 6, and Muz-
no: 3, where one he who keeps dogs everyday one
qfrat of hIS good :vorks whereas In the other passage nvo qfra;s are subtracted.
Reward and pUnIshment are often valued in q'lrat in the 1J.adith: 'He who per-
forms over a corpse the prayer of the jinaza has a qll1'at, he 'who follO'i.... s the
funeral procession has two,' al-Tirmidhi. I, p. 194.
3- Frequently, e.g. al·Tirmidbi, I, p. 285, 16.
" Al.Suhayli in the notes to Ibn Hisham, p. 190. The book al-Istib$ar ftma-
fllhi'l-akkbar by. theologian al-+lisi (d. 460) also concems
Itself ":Ith SUC? (m respect of legal traditions), V. Rosen, Notices
manuscnts au .i\1useeasiatique, St Petersburg, 188r] r;"p. 27·
Matenal for the gradually mcreasing lack of care is in al·Zurqani n pp
I5
8lf
. ' , .
I42 VOLUME TWO: CHAPTER 4
This particularity of the Muslim critics of traditioJ;ls might be
illustrated by = example from the sphere of its application. Amongst
the many varieties of tendentious traditions, one group is noticeable,
the part which might best be named the traditions of schools, i.e.
hadiths which have been invented within a particular theological
~ c h o o l for the purpose of demonstrating its excellence as opposed to
another rival school, and of giving weight =d authority to their
own teachings. Tendentious traditions were not only frequently
invented against dogmatic heresies but the Prophet is made the
supreme arbiter of the differences between the 'Iraqi= =d I:Iijazi=
theologi=s (see above, p. 82). To prove that Abu I:Ianifa was the
best teacher of religious law, his followers invented this !).adith:
'In my community there will rise a man called Abu Hanifa who will
be the torch of the community." Abu Hurayra is the companion
who is alleged to have heard these words from the Prophet directly.
Belief that Muhammed mentioned the 'Iraqi= theologi= by name
was not too much for circles who could be expected to believe in the
discovery that the poet Abu Dhu'ayb and the pretender to the
throne, Ibn al-Zubayr, are mentioned in the Tawrat,' =d to whom
the monks of the 'People of the Book' could say that in their holy
books there is a description of Mu'awiya's person so clear that the
[150] first Umayyad ruler could have been picked out from among a
large number of people on the strength of it.
3
To such people it was
but sell-evident that the oral tradition from the Prophet could
mention Abu H=ifa. But the Medini=s were not to be outdone;
their school, too, was to be based on the Prophet's authority. For
this purpose they made up this saying of Muhammed (also referred
back to the authority of Abu Hurayra): 'You will hit the fI=ks of
the riding animals' (make long journeys) in order to seek (religious)
science and you will find no one more learned th= the scholars of
Medina." This has a Malikite sense. The saying found its way into
several sunna-collections and even Muslim, who applied strict
st=dards for correct traditions, as we shall see, wanted originally
to include it in his collection. He omitted it not because of the
contents or the impossibility that Muhammed should have referred
to the conditions of schools in the second century, but because of
the 'disease of the isnaa.' In it Abu'l-Zubayr is connected with AbU
Sali!). as his hearer, which is a chronological impossibility. If the
, Tahdhib, p. 702. [Cl. also ai-Khatib, Tarlkh, XIII, p. 335·1
S ZDMG. XXXII, p. 35!. A monk also found another Arabian poet men·
Honed in a parchment scroll, Agh" VI, p. 155-
a Al.Mubarrad, pp. 574f.; Ibn Badro.n, pp. zoo, 202.
.. For this expression cf. al-Mas'udi, V, p. r07. 3. al-'Iqd, II, p. 285. 17:
l;atta 4uribat .alayhi aMP a Z ~ 'ibil; in the last·named passage in evil sense: the
camels are being hastened towards Medina to threaten 'Uthman.
:. Ma§iib'lb al.Sunna, I, p. 17.
REACTION AGAINST THE FABRICATION OF I.IADITHS I43
forgers of this tradition had made up the preceding catena with
greater care their product would presumably be found in the $a/:tilt
of the conscientious Muslim.'
Muslim circles who have retained up to the most recent times the
old methods of study still follow the same direction that we have
encountered as the method of centuries long past. 'Ali b. Sulaymiin
al-Bajama'wi, a theologi= who in recent times has taken great
pains in his commentaries on the six c=onical works on tradition,
says: 'One of the str=gest things has ever happened to me was this:
when I recited the traditional sayings according to which scholars
are told not to mingle with the sultans, one of my listeners said:
"How could the Prophet have said this, since there were no sultans
in his days?'" This poor man did not know of the tradition that the
apostle of God had predicted with prophetical insight everything [151]
that is going to happen until the hour of resurrection.'3
The criticism of traditions thus has only two points in mind:
reliability of the rijal and the inner foundation of the chain of isnaa.
While in regard to the latter point objective certainty was possible,
inasmuch as the chronological dates (the years of death: wafayat, as
it was said) were closely investigated, the first point was much more
subject to the taste and subjective judgement of the critic. Only in
rare cases was it possible to reach agreement on the degree of trust-
worthiness of a person. Often there are the most contradictory
qualifications applied to one =d the same informant. Ibn Sa'id
al-Darimi (see above, p. I40) , reports for example, that he once
asked Ya!).ya b. Mu'in about ]ubayr b. al-I:Iasan and was told:
laysa bi-shay'in, (he is invalid; AbU I:Iiitim said: lei ara bi-ltaaithihi
ba'san (I see no evil in his !).adith); al-Nasa'i gave him the mark
rla'if (weak, i.e. untrustworthy).' Occasionally judgements are
vacillating' =d the terminology created by the ahl al-naqa (critics)
is sufficiently elastic to allow the avoidance of a definitive judgement.
The following marks were given to Layth b. Abi Sulaym: al-
, AI-DamirI (s.v. al.Matiyya) , II, p. 382.
:. The rationalist appears not to have known that the expression sul/ihl- is
much older than this sentence and originally only occurred in the meaning
'government', and only later became the title of a ruling person (1,Iadhf al·
muif,af). Sultan is used in the first sense also in ancient legal literature, e.g.
in the well·known rule that a marriage is only valid if the bride is supported by
a wali 'and the sultan (neuter, not masc.) is the support of those who have
no other waH' (e.g. al-Tirmidhi, T, p. 204, 6).
So Commentary to Abu Dawud, p. 175.
• Yaqilt, IV, p. 1034, I9ff.
.5 An interesting example is in Ibn Khaldiln, ll1ttqaddima, p. 26r, where on
the occa.c;ion of the criticism of the Mahdi: tradition the whole scale of good
and bad judgements of various critics is cited in respect of one and the same
authority. The whole passage can 'be recommended as a spE"cimen of Muslim
criticism of the traditions.
144 VOLUME TWO: CHAPTER 4
Bukhiiri: wa-rubbamii yahim ji'i-shay', i.e. truthful but errs
occasionally; A1).mad b. I;Ianbal: 'his 1).adith gives no joy (iii yufral;
ji l;adithihi) , often he relates communications back to the Prophet
(yarfa') which in parallel communications of others are not taken
as far back as that, therefore he has been declared weak (rJa"afah,,):'
Thus one does not know whether to regard him as or rJa"f·
It would have been impossible to create a fixed canon for such
[152] things. The critics themselves maintain' that the abili;ty to judge
value of traditions can only be gained by long-contmued handling
of this material (bi-tal ai-mujiilasa wa'i-munii:;ara wa'Z-mudhiikara).
In the absence of strict methodical rples, the subjective faculty of a
man, his sense of discrimination, was in the end taken as decisive:
dhawq al-mu!laddith'n, as it is called, the scholar's subjective taste
in differentiating the 'healthy' from the 'diseased'.' Occasionally
the formal points of view of Muslim critics also led to criticisms of
some elements of the contents. In the course of examining the
trustworthiness of the isniids it was frequently found that certain
authorities usually appeared as informants for traditions which were
marked as suspect (munkar).· Even such evaluations were mainly
conditioned by formal motives,
5
but the contemplation of the
traditions often led to the recognition that-as Abu Nu'aym al-
Isfahani (d. 430) said-'such traditions lack light and in their
darkness predominates';' in other words that their style and con-
tents showed unmistakable signs of spuriousness. But it was just
this side of criticism which have always to be left to individual
dhawq.
1 AI-Tirmidhi. II. p. 131.
Z 'Abd al.R.allman b. Mahdi (d. Ig8) in Tahdhib. p. 392; top, note the
context of this passage.
1I Al.Dhahabi, in Tabaq al-Mufassirin. ed. Meursinge, p. 17. no. 50.
'We give as examples: al_Tirmidhi, I, pp. 28, 21; 295, bottom; II, pp. 293.
3; 329, 19·
.s See the definitions in Risch. p. r8.
'In his introduction to Musnad Mustakhraj 'alii $al;f,l; Muslim (Cairo
MS., :E;Iad. no. 417) Cairo, Cat. I, p. 307. cf. lawii,'il; at-wad' alayhi tiihira.
Khiz.al-Adab, J, p. 48, bottom.
CHAPTER FIVE [153]
THE I:IADITH AS A MEANS
OF EDIFICATION AND
ENTERTAINMENT
, I
aN principle the criticism of Muslim theologians covers all branches
of traditional accounts, but it must be noted that communal senti-
ment differentiated between various grades in the ethical judgement
of the invention of traditions. We have already seen earlier ,that
strict censure of the circulation of spurious traditions was not
prevalent everywhere, and that the best people admitted alleviating
circumstances from certain viewpoints for the invention and
spreading of false traditions (p. 56). Strict judgement was usually
reserved for those 1).adiths which dealt with questions of what was
allowed and what forbidden (baliii wa-bariim), i.e. legal traditions or
such as could serve as eources for legal and dogmatic deductions.'
These latter have to be free of apocryphal accretions since they are
evidence for the fixing of the sunna and are gnides to actions and
abstentions, convictions and opinions, by which it was sought to
obtain God's pleasure. Many theologians were less strict with 1).adiths
which did not belong to the category of the law but offered pious
tales, edifying maxims and ethical teachings in the name of the
Prophet. Though falsifications in this field were not actually ap-
proved of, it was nevertheless said that the isnaas of such sayings
need not be quite as stringently examined
2
as those of sunna, i.e.
legal, traditions. Informants whose appearance in an isniid of a
1).adIth referring to the law made the latter invalid were considered
trustworthy enough for ethical1;LadIths.
2
AI-Nawawi recommended [154]
a certain musiimaba (indulgence) towards them: 'it may be a weak
1 Cf. Sprenger. ZDMG. X, p. 16, ult.
I In relating them the isniid may well be left out, Rawd aZ-Rayii-
1)fnjf Ijikayat (Cairo, 1297), p. 5, 13H.
3 al-Khaho aI-Baghdadi, fo1. 38b [ed. Hyderabad. p. 137] cites among others
AQmad. b. I?:anbaI: idha ruflIi:na 'an 1"asUl Allah ft'Z-1;laliil wa'l-1;la1"am wa'l-
sunan wa'l-a1;lkiim shaddadnii ji'!-asii,nfd wa-idha ruwina 'an l'asiil AlIa'!. fi
jaq,a'il al-a'mal. ... tasiikalnii jfZ-asiinid.
I46 VOLUME TWO: CHAPTER 5
l:Jadith but onefeels content with it' (I;adith Ija''l! wa-liikin yusta'nas
bihi).l In view of their pious purpose they were allowed to
pass. Certain circles went even further and positively encouraged
the creation of false traditional sentences. There was little if any
objection to the fact that in an ethical work (Tanb;h al-Ghaftl;n)
of the highly respected theologian Abu'I-Layth aI-Samarqandi
(d. 375) many mawlju'iit (spurious 1.Jadiths) are quoted' and it
needed fanatical persecutors of mawlju'iit like Ibn aI-Jawzi to
redact a recension of the I[,yii' by Al-GazaJi purged of all
suspect 1.Jadiths.
3
It hardly ever happened that anyone objected
to weak l:Jadiths used in the ethical parts of the Il;yii'.
The invention, particularly of l:Jadiths for ethical, hortatory
and ascetic purposes', was theoretically sanctionedbythetheological
school of the Karrfuniyya and their opinion was then put into
practice, as al-Nawawi has it, 'by some ignorant people who called
themselves ascetics, in order to incite to good-as they wrongly
thought.' 5 Sermons were apparently the field of predilection for such
invented sentences with moralizing tendencies.' In the fifth century,
public preachers in Baghdad had to show traditional sentences used
in their sermons to their chief, the famous Abu Bakr Al:Jrnad al-
Khatib ai-Baghdadi (d. 463), before they were allowed to make
public use of them,' which is a proof of how frivolously traditions
were treated in this circle. Those who upheld the doctrine, that
for moral purposes it was permissible to invent traditions and to
[1551 circulate them freely, attempted to find theological foundations for
their views. For the study of the methods of theological casuistry
it is interesting to hear the chief argument used by them. The
traditional saying in which the invention of prophetical l:Jadiths is
forbidden is this; 'He who knowingly relates lies about me ('alayya)
[in order to misguide men] may he take his place in the fires of
hell." The words between square brackets are not found in the
original text of the sentence and are added with the intention of
making possible the deduction that inventions which do not
misguide men are permissible. Then it says: 'Who reports lies
'alayya: which is interpreted as being contrary to Iii (for me, in
my favour)=against me. Thereby inventions which strengthen
1 Mantkurat, fo1. 17a, of the 1,ladith justifying talqin before the grave.
2 Cairo Cat. II, p. 151.
a Ibid., p. 132, bottom [GAL I, p. 540, no. 2; 5 It p. 748, no. 2].
... Fi'l-targMb wa'l.tarMb wa'l-zuhd; this question is treated in the
fol. 42b [naw 21, trans1.]A (Igor). XVII, p. 124].
/; AI-Nawawi, to Muslim, introduction, p. 32.
G Cf. Ahmed Khan Bahadur's 'Essay on Mohammedan Tradition: in Hughes,
Diet. of Islam. p. 64za.
"1 Tab. l;Iuff., XIV, no. !4.
8 See above, p. I27.
THE J;lADiTH AS A MEANS OF EDIFICATION 147
piety and lead to the fear of God are not to be condemned.!
Thus, inventing traditions for good ends was practised bona fide
and the forgers, when confronted with specialists, do not appear to
have been ashamed of their deeds but admitted them freely. It is
well-known that there are a number of pious sayings referred back
to the Prophet which praise the excellences of certain Suras of the
Koran and where the reward of pious people occupying themselves
with those Suras is accurately calcqlated. Some commentaries
on the Koran-e.g. the tafs;r of aI-Bayc;lawi-and every sura with
such a saying. These sentences were originally taken from an
extended l:Jadith in which they are listed in order. This inventory of
'excellences of the Koranic sfuas' is traced back through Abu' I,ma
aI-Jami' to 'Ikrima, who is said to have obtained it from Ibn
'Abbas. It will be instructive to hear the account of Abu 'Ammar
of Marw about the origin of these sayings. "Abu was asked
where he got this tradition which is traced back to 'Ikrirna and Ibn
'Abbas, since it was not transmitted by 'Ikrima's own companions.
He answered: '1 have seen that people tum away from the Koran
and'prefer to occupy themselves with the fiqh of Abu J:Ianifa and the
stones (maghiiz;) of Ibn Is!)aq; therefore I have invented this
saying with the intention of pleasing God (I;isbatan) (in order to win
people again for the Koran).' Another originator of traditions of this
kind, Maysara b. 'Abdi Rabbihi, likewise admits that he invented
them in order to turn people back to the study of the Koran. The
same confession is reported in respect of other inventions of this
kind. Al-Mu'antrnal b. Isma'j] reports: 'A sheikh transmitted to me [156]
in the name of Ubayy b. Ka'b, sayings about the excellences of
!C0ran in the order of the suras and mentioning each one; as author-
Ity he gave a man from aI-Mada'in who is still alive. I visited this
man and when asked as to his source he referred me to a sheikh in
Wasit, who referred me to a sheikh in Basra who in turn named
a sheikh in 'Abbadan as informant. I then myself to the
latter. The sheikh Jed me into the company of $iin adepts amongst
whom there was one whom he pointed out as informant for the
tradition circulated by him. 'VVhere did you get this tradition from?'
I asked the $un. The man answered: '1 heard it from no one, but we
noticed that people neglect the Koran and therefore made up this
saying of the Prophet in order to lead back their hearts to the
Koran"." Such traditions were already common in the third
century, for aI-Tirmidhi mentions several examples,' and in the
1 In al-Nawawi, op. cit., pp. 38f, we find, set out at length, the arguments
and their orthodox refutation.
! Al.suyo.tr, Itqan, II, p. 18z=al-Khatib aI-Baghdadi, fol. IIoa [ed. Hydera-
bad,p·7oI ].
11 Abwab thawiib al·qur'an 'an rasul Alliih, al-Tirmidhi, II, pp. 143ff.
I48 VOLUME TWO: CHAPTER 5
Sunan of al-Diirimi they fill a whole chapter,' though not all these
sayings are attributed to the Prophet but are mainly quoted iu the
name of later theologians. How generally they had been accepted
is shown by the fact that the saying 'everyone who reads a thousand
verses of the Koran in one night will be accredited with one qintiir
of good works' has caused a vast apparatus of metrological investiga-
tions.
2
II
A phenomenon particularly worthy of notice shows how light-
heartedly moral sayings which were not his were ascribed to the
Prophet. It is not at all rare in literature of. trad.itions
sayings are ascribed to the Prophet whIch for along tnne CIrculated m
Islam under the authority of another name. So-called
mawq"ja, Le. sayings traced back to companions or even. success.ors,
were very easily transformed into marj,,'a, I.e. saymgs
[157] traced back to the Prophet, by simply adding without much scruple
a few names at random which were necessary to complete the chain.'
This was also often practised in the field of legal traditions. But
matters went further still. People did not shrink from ascribing to
the Prophet agreeable sayings from pagan times, which could. be
the more readily done since it became known that Muhannned hun-
self did not hesitate to incorporate into the Koran sentences from
paganism.
4
In a previous study' it has already been pointed out
{
that the Prophet's saying 'Help your ?rother, be he. or
persecuted' is an old Arabic proverb, probably ongmatmg WIth
pagan circles.
6
The Muslims liked it and thus ascribed it to the
Prophet.7 The sentence very often quoted among the sayings of the
Prophet: ' the good is tied to the forelocks of horses' can be found in
a poemby Imru' u1-Qays.6 .'.
Another side of this phenomenon deservmg closer study IS the
teaching (occurring in many variations) that one should not mix in
things which do not concern one (tark mii Iii ya'nfhi). We meet this
1 Al.Dariml, pp. 430ft'.
2 Ibid, p. 440,
3 E.g, al-Tirmidhi, I, pp. 90, bottom, 179 bottom, 263 bottom, 267. 22;
289, uff.; II, pp. 167. 15; 190, bottom, 233. 6; and very frequently. People
suspect of 'pushing back' interrupted 1)adiths were called raffa'. Ibn Khaldiin,
Muqaddima. p. 265, 17.
... Part I, p. 228, note 3.
Ii pp. 154f. . _ . .
6 Hudhayl., p. 134, 19: yU'inuka ma?!ii.man wa-yu dtka ?alzman, ct. m a
later poet: yasurruka mu#uman wa-yar4ika raUman,. Agh., VII, p.
12
3,.6:
'1 The earliest appearance of this sentence as a saYIng of the Prophet IS In al.
Shaybani (K. al-Siyar, fol. 5ga. W]L, XL, p. 60, no. Ig1) [I, p. 179]·
S AI.Damirl, I. p. 385; d. Imrq., 8:1.
THE J!:ADITH AS A MEAN5 OF EDIFICATION I49
saying in various combinations as a basic teaching of Muslim ethics
in the name of the Prophet,' and thus every virtuous person whose
good attributes are praised is always praised for practising this
virtue.
2
But the oldest sources ascribe these teachings to others: to
Luqman,3 to the caliph 'Umar 1,
4
his son 'Abd Allah,' the son of
l:lusayn,
6
'Umar II,
7
and even to a1-Shiifi 'j,' The of Seth and
Ibrahim are also occasionally mentioned as the source for this
saying,· which originally counted as a maxim of wisdom, as a
recommendation of an attribute of in the old Arabic sense (d.
Part I, p. 203)" and not at all as a religious teaching. In the sense
of [tilm it is also mentioned amongst some wise rules of l:laritha b.
Badr (d. 50), a representative of the old muruwwa in the first decades
of Islam.'· Nevertheless it is later generally transmitted as a l).adith
of the Prophet. By the same process sentences from the Old Testa-
ment" and the Gospels found their way in amongst the sayings of
Muhannned.
12
Everything that seemed to the theologians of those
days, when the development of tradition was at its height, worthy to
be adopted, was preferably reproduced in the form of a l).adith.
In this guise it could become a formative element of Islamic teaching.
II!
The conviction, hardly disputed, that for the good of the
Muslim people, and to further piety and inspire the practice of
1 As such it can also be found amongst the Arba'£n al-Nawawf, as no. 12.
'I: 'Abd aI.Malik is praised: kana tarikan bi'l·dukhul ftma Ia ya'niki., Ansab at.
p. 162; similarly Malik characterizes Ja'far al-Baqir (d. 148) in
Zuruq, I, p. 20g, as having this virtue; in later biographical works as often
as the opposite if when people are praised for being muqbiIan 'ala rna ya'niM,
e.g. Ibn BashkuwaJ., pp. :202, 453. 496, 516, 518. 593, 61:2, etc.; ct. Ab'U'I·
MaJ;lasin, I, p. 541, 15.
s AI-Muwa1ta'. IV, p. 22T al-hadUh wa'ada' al-amana wa·tark rna Iii
ya'nfhi are three attributes through which Luqman acquired long life; ct. al-
Maydani, II. p. 227.
, K. al-Kharaj, p. 8, 7 from below: lata'tari4j£ma etc.
5 AI·ShaybaniMuwaUa', p. 386.
'Al-Ya'qfLbi, II, p. 364, penult.
7 Fragm. kist. arab., p. 40 bottom, among the five things which he demanded
in his speech from the throne.
S TalulMb, p. 70, 6.
II Cf. the commentaries to the al.NawawI, p. 28; al-Fashanr, p. 48.
10 Agh., XXI. p. 43, IS. [For the saying cf. also al·GhazaJ.i, Ihya', I, Bab:2;
Hujwiri, Kaskj transl. Nicholson, p. II; Ibn Khaldiln, Pr<Jl.,
III, p. rg6; Goldziher, ZDMG, LXVII, p. 532].
11 Instead of the many possible examples, only: al-Mas'ildi, IV, p. 168, 4:
t'a's al·1;ikma ma'rifat Allah as saying of Muhammed. Instead of rna'fila the
word makhafat also occurs (d. Provo 9:10) in Fleischer, Leip. Cat., p. 428 a,
bottom.
IS See Excurses and Annotations.
[158]
150 VOLUME TWO: CHAPTER 5
religious virtues and legal duties
l
it was permissible to invent and
circulate sayings of the Prophet, was, as the literature of traditions
shows, most popular with people occupied with the circulation of
traditions, whether honestly ad majorem dei gloriam or in their own
interest. Therefore the biographies of ascetics and moralists
l
after
[159J praising their pious life and eagerness for the religious cause, fre-
quently add a note to the effect that they were unreliable in respect
of the traditions or even that they invented many false traditions.'
This freedom, which was taken for granted without scruples, was
gradually indulged in in ever-widening circles. A portal was opened
by which the most various elements could enter. Not everywhere, or
at all times, did the pious motives prevail. Edification was joined
by a psychologically related element: entertaimnent, intellectual
enjoyment. Then it was not for long that one distinguished between
various grades of it. Edifying tales slowly developed into enter-
taining ones and one soon arrived at farce, all within the framework
of the tradition of the Prophet. It was possible, as early as the third
century and perhaps even before, to exclaim in the name of the
Prophet: 'Woe to him who spreads false 1)adiths to entertain the
people, woe to him, woe,"
We will now examine those circles addressed withtriple woe, and at
first shall neglect chronolOgical order. It is told, under the date of the
death of the Koran reader and singer Mu1)ammad b. Ja'far al-'Adami
(d. 349), that he once made the pilgrimage to Mecca in the company
of Mu1)ammad al-Asadi and the philologist Abii'l-Qasim. Arriving
outside Medina the pilgrims noticed a blind man with a nwnber of
pilgrims gathered round him listening to the false traditions he was
telling. Abu' l-Qasim wanted to stop the impostor, but the Koran
reader disapproved of such action, fearing lest it would cause the
mob to defend the story-teller and to turn against his critics. He
hit on an appropriate measure: he began to recite the Koran himself
and, hardly did the blind man's audience hear his beautiful recitation,
than they left the teller of traditions and gathered around the
Koran-reader instead.' What could the story of the blind man have
been like? On another occasion, also in Medina, a street preacher
treated the crowd to this saying of the Prophet: 'Who fasts in the
[160J months of Rajab, Sha'ban and Ramagan, for him Allah will bulld a
palace in paradise. The hall of the palace will measure a thousand
square miles and each gate will measure ten square miles,' The poet
Bashshar b. Burd, who was just passing when the preacher reached
1 E.g. Tabaqat al·Mu!ass., ed. Meursinge, p. II. no. 3T, S.V. b.
'Ali 'i: this was an ascetic preacher (d. 434): 'but in his l;1.adith there
are enormities, he was generally suspect of inventions.'
I Al.Tirmidhi. II, p. SI.
:5 Abfi'l.MaJ;ta:sin, II, p. 353.
•
THE I:IADITH AS A MEANS OF EDIFICATION lSI
that point, disturbed him by calling 'Verily, such a palace must be a
dreadful place in the winter,'l
These story-tellers of course boasted full sanads with which they
prefaced their own invented sayings. The latter were chiefly con-
cerned with the Prophet's biography, the subject of eschatology and
cosmological fables, such as appealed to the tastes of street aud-
iences. When the Imam A1)mad b. I:Ianbal and his companion
Ya1)ya b. Mu'in were perfornling their prayers in a mosque in one
of the suburbs of Baghdad a popular preacher appeared there-
since they used to gather their listeners round themselves not only
in the streets but also in the mosques-and told his audience this
lie: 'A1)mad b. I:Ianbal and Ya1)ya b. Mu'in report to us it was told
by 'Abd al-Razzaq, from Ma'm;lI, from Qatada, from Anas, who
said the Prophet said: "He who says there is no god but Allah, for
him God will create a bird from eac1l word in the sentence; its beak
will be of gold and its wings pure diamonds" '-and going on in this
vein he produced a long rigmarole which would fill twenty pages.
A1)mad and Ya1)ya eyed each other with astonishment and each
asked the other whether he had really been the author of this tradi-
tion. But each reassured the other that he had no knowledge
whatsoever of the saying. When the preacher had finished his lecture
the two learned theologians called him to them and, thinking that
they too would give him some money, he hastened to them. When
asked by Ya1)ya from whom he had obtained the tradition which
he had quoted, the man replied that he had it from A1)mad b.
I:Ianbaland Ya1)ya b. MU'In. 'I am Ya1)ya b. Mu'in and thisisA1)mad
b. I:Ianbal; such a sentence never reached our ear. Friend, if you
must tell lies, please select others as authority for them and spare
us.' 'Verily', replied the cunning preacher, 'I now see why people
say that Ya1)ya b. Mu'in is mad. As if there were no other people of
the name Ya1)ya b. Mu'inl I alone have transmitted from seventeen
different persons called A1)mad b. I:Ianbal and Ya1)ya b. Mu'in'.'
This subterfuge appears not to have been unusual with these sly [161J
popular preachers.' It is told from earlier times that Harim b.
I:Iayyan (d. 46)-the same of whom it is related that his mother
carried him for four years-met a story-teller in a mosque who told
religious tales quoting him (Harim) as authority. When Harim
revealed his identity and it became obvious that the story-teller
had never seen him, the latter answered there and then: 'I have
always heard that you were a strange fellow; what you are saying now
is very odd indeed. In this mosque alone there are fifteen people
praying with us who are called Harim b. I:Iayyan and you appear
, Agh., III, p. 30.
I Ibn al·Jawzl, K, aJkQU$$i!$. £01. 109.
: We meet this also in the circle of hellenists, Agh., XXI, p. 90, 7.
152 VOLUME TWO: CHAPTER 5
to flatter yourself with the thought that you are the only one
bearing this name." It need not be pointed out that this tale has been
back-dated to those early patriarchal times from the circnmstances
of a later period. In Harim's times there was no such system of
tradition as might have produced these excesses.
The men who entertained and edified the crowds in the street and
mosques by reciting apt traditions for this pnrpose without being
officially appointed for this task were called or pI.
i.e. story-tellers.
2
Only the holy subject of their tales differ-
entiated them from profane tellers of anecdotes' who gathered
audiences at street corners in order to recite piquant stories and
yarns; these latter seem to have had the same function as humorous
papers have with us and they were even invited to the court of
the caliphs. In the earliest times of Islam the name did not
apparently carry the unfavourable connotation which it gained in
the course of the further development of the class which inherited
it from more praiseworthy ancestors. The Prophet himself (Sura
7 :175, 12:3) used the name in respect of his own message, and
in traditional stories he is quoted as speaking favourably of pious
preachers who bore the name of According to the Muslim
account the development of this profession reaches back to the
earliest period of Islam. 'Umar is said to have given express per-
mission 'to tell stories to the people's to the pious Tamim al-Dfui
[162l or (according to others) to 'Ubayd b. 'Umayr, the first real
Up to Umayyad times-under Mu'awiya, espccially the well-
known Ka'b-pious men are named, who with the approval of the
orthodox authorities practised freelance preaching and endeavoured
to strengthen men in the beliefs, virtues and hopes of Islam by
means of pious tales. We meet them in the ranks of the army, where
they encourage the fighters for religion with pious exhortation-
similarly to the task of the poets in pagan times.
6
One of the earliest
refcrences to this class of Muslim society is the account of three
in the camp of the warriors who in the seventh decade of the
Hijra, in the reign of Marwan r, went forth under the leadership of
Snlayman b. in order to revenge the blood of I;Iusayn. The
1 AI-Mubarrad. p. 356.
% [For the qu§#i$ see also Goldziher, ZDMG. I, p. 478, Richtungen. pp. S8:ff.;
J. Pedersen, 'The Islamic preacher: wii.'iz, mudhakkir, qaH,' Goldziher Memorial
Volume, I (1948), pp. 226£f. idem. 'The criticism of the Islamic preacher:
Dit> Welt des Islams, 1952, pp. 2Is:ff·J
3 AI.Mas'Odi, VIII, p. r6rff.
Ibn al.Jawzi, fo1. ga.
s Ibid., fo1s. 16-17.
6 Ci. Part I, pp. 48-g. According to Ab'ii J::Ian. aI·DIu., p. 128, 15, Sa'd used
the old poets 'Amr b. Ma'dlkarib, Qays b. Hubayra and Shura1).bil b. al-Samt
to encourage- the Arab warriors before the battle of Qadisiyya.
THE :(iAD!TH AS A MEANS OF EDIFICATION 153
three men kindled the enthusiasm of the fighters and divided their
task in such a way that, while two officiated in particnlar parts of
the army, the third wandered all the time about the camp addressing
the troops, now here, now there, with inciting speeches.' We hear of
the activity of the also in the third century: a man named
Abu A1)mad al-Tabali received the nickname al-Qa." because he had
accompanied the Muslimtroops iri their wars against Daylamites and
Greeks, stimnlating their courage by pious tales.' were also
mentioned with distinction as expounders of the Koran. In the second
century Musa al-Uswali and 'Amr b. Qa'id al-Uswali were renowned
in this field in 'Iraq, and both are also mentioned as highly respected
The first gave lectures on the Koran simultaneously in
Arabic and Persian; on his right the Arabs were seated and on his
left the Persians, and he handled both languages with equal elo-
quence. remarks: 'He is one of the wonders of the world
(min 'ajii'ibal-dunyii)' for normally when these two languages meet
on the same tongne one of them usually damages the others (ad-
khalat kuU"n minh"mii al-4aym 'alii this Musa is a rare
exception.' The other Uswar! gave such detailed lectures on lafsiY
that he needed forty-six years to work through the Koran; in this
way he spent several weeks on the explanation of a single verse.' [163]
In so far as the served serious religious ends, whether as
homiletic exegetes or as tellers of sacred stories, they were left
alone and undisturbed in their pious work; official theology gladly
tolerated these free preachers and popular theologians, who in
street or mosque condescended to the level of the understanding of
the people, and spread amongst them ascetic beliefs which were not
fostered by official theologians, who were chiefly bound up in the
study of law, but which were publicly represented by these circles.
gives extracts from the, sermons of such men' and we do
not hear that they were hindered in the exercise of their profession,
which constituted a complementary element in the religious life
of Islam.
IV
It was only the abuses and excesses of the that were com-
bated. Such measures as we hear of were directed against greedy
imposters who had at heart not religious ends but the amusement
of the masses by means of the invention and circulation of false
, Tab.. II, p. 559.
2 Ibn al-Mulaqqin (Leiden Ms., Warner no. 532), fol. Ira; TahdMb, p. 741.
3 K. fol. Iub [I, p. 368; the correct form of the name is 'Amr b.
Fa-'id and he spent thirty-four years on the explanation of the Koran, and died
before finishing his task].
.. ibid, fo1. 127b [II, p. 31J (e.g. 'Abd al-Ghazzal
IS4 VOLUME TWO: CHAPTER S
traditions and fabnlous elaborations of religious stories. The zeal
of conservative theologians was directed against this section of
religious legends, which was completely beyond religious control.
We have information about this from comparatively ancient times.
The earliest reference is a note from Sa'id b. ]ubayr, preserved in al-
Bukhari,' according to which a qii$$ by the name of Nawf b. Fa<;laIa
worked in Kiifa. Ibn 'Abbas called him an 'enemy of God'('aduww
Alliih)-who denied that Moses, who in the Koran was brought into
connection with Khidr, was to be identifiedwith the prophet of Israel.
This report presumably refers later events to earlier days.
2
As soon
as the danger from such story-tellers to the proper preservation of
traditions was realized, an attempt was made to discredit the
beginnings of their profession by assigning them to the Kharijite
[1641 camp.' But these street preachers, were persecuted only when,
particularly in 'Iraq, they increased at such a rate that Ibn 'Awn
(d. ISI) conld report that in the mosque at Ba,ra only one single
group gathered round the teacher of legal science whereas countless
groups flocked to hear the story-tellers, who filled the mosques. <
How credulous ordinary people were is seen from the following tale.
The poet Knlthum b. 'Amr al-'Attabi, who lived in the time of
Harlin and al-Ma'mlin, gathered the worshippers in a mosque of the
capital and told them this l,1adIth: 'He who can reach the tip of his
nose with his tongue may be sure that he will not go to hell: As on a
signal all present stuck out their tongues attempting to find out
whether they possessed this pass to paradise.
5
It is understandable
that the amusing and entertaining tales of the story-tellers were
more attractive to the people than were the difficnlt material of
professional theologians, especially as the story-tellers shrank from
nothing which wonld draw the people. gives an example of
the boundless frivolity in the tales of a narrator called Abu Ka'b.'
Soon the governments issued edicts against story-tellers. In 279 it was
announced in the streets of Baghdad that in neither streets nor mos-
ques were story-tellers, astrologers or fortune-tellers to an? a
little later, in 284, a similar order was made.' The company m whlCh
1 B. TafsIr, no. 163, to Sl1ra r8:60.
2 Here belongs also an account in al-Ya'qlibi, II, p. 270, according to which
aI·Hasan corrected a man who worked as qii$$ in front of the mosque of the
Pro'phet at Medina by telling him that only the Prophet was entitled to this
name.
S Ibn al-Jawzi. fo1. IS.
, Ibid., fol. II.
• Agh., XII, p. 5.
6 K. al.Hayawan, foL X2Ib [III, 24-5].
7 Tab., III, pp. 2131, 3; 2165 passim: Abft'l-Mal;1asin, II, p. 87. 2. In last
passage an lii yaq'uda qaq,in must be corrected to yaqU$$a qa$$un. In this order
book·dealers are also forbidden to sell philosophical and dialectical works.
1
,
THE :(lADITH AS A MEANS OF EDIFICATION ISS
street preachers are listed here clearly shows the view taken of them
in official circles. A little while after the publication of these govern-
ment orders, al-Mas'udI gives us a vivid description of the inclination
of the popnlace in his day, 'They only gather round bear-tamers
and monkey-leaders . . . they follow false saints and workers of
miracles, lend their ears to lying qU$$ii$ or gape at someone con-
demned to whipping or to the gallows:
'
A document from the
fourth century by the poet and belletrist Abu Dulaf al-Khazraji [1651
illuminates the cause which gave rise to these decrees even better
than this description. This poet wrote a which is highly
instructive from the point of view of historians of cnlture." He des-
cribed in it the doings of the so-called mukaddin or B. Sasan,<
the commentary on which is a mine of information on the social
circumstances of those days.6 The B. Sasan are known from al-
I:Iariri's XLIX Maqiima (al-Siisiiniyya), the testament of Abu
Zayd in which the latter initiates his son in the Sasanic arts.' The
treatise by Abu Dnlaf paints a picture of imposters, jugglers and
tricksters of the worst type. Amongst the miracnlous healers'
and amnlet writers, the qU$$ii$ also appear: 'Amongst US are those
who tell of the Isra'il (commentary: legends of the prophets) or of
"span by span" (shibran 'alii shibrin, i.e, short stories as big as a
square span; such stories there,fore are also called al-shibriyyiit);'
then there are amongst us those who hand down isniids, whole
libraries full:"
They also practise the following device; among others. They
gather a large crowd and then one qliH takes up his position at one
1 AI.MaS''Cldi:, V, p. 86.
I Before that al·· Ukbari, called'sM.'ir al·mukaddf,n,' had written a
similar but shorter qa$f,da which can be found in YaUmat al.Dahr, II, p. 285.
In both these imposters are introduced as speaking.
a But also from that of lexicography. From this piece the dictionary could
be extraordinarily enriched with words and meanings which are not yet noted
in supplements and appendices.
4 For the origin of the name, see the commentary to de Sacy's edition of al.
I;1arirl, 2nd ed., p. 23.
$ This may serve to explain an interesting excerpt belonging to the literature,
which Houtsma has reproduced from a Ms. of Amin, Cat. ar. Lugd. Batav.,
I, pp. 249-51 [al.Bayhaqi, al-Mahasin ma'l-Masawf" ed. F. Schwally, pp. 624ff.,
ct. Schwally, ZA, 1912, pp. 420ff.]. How these imposters allied themselves
with is seen ibid., p. 250, 12.
I AI-I;Iariri, ibid., pp. 659ft'.
1 Fiikikat al·Khulajii', p. 63, penult., likens a quack to AbO. Zayd and
Sasan.
S Yatimat al-Dakr, III, p. 179, 12:ff. It IQ.ight be tempting to interpret 'span
by span' by the fact that the pretended to know the smallest details of
the material of their stories (cf. ya'rif bi-sMbr, ZDPV, p. 166).
II Wa-man yarwi'Z-asanf,da wa-bashwa kulli qimtarin, YaHmat al-Dakr, III,
p. 184, 4·
[166]
[167]
VOLUME TWO: CHAPTER 5
end of the street and tells stories about the excellences of 'Ali,l
and at the other end his colleague praises Abu Balrr beyond measure,
'thus they lose neither the dirham of the Na"ibi" nor that of the
Shi'i, and at the end they share among themselves the collected
dirhams.'
This state of affairs obtained also later. In the sixth century the
rhetorician Ibn al-Athir mentions 'story-tellers' in one breath with
jugglers (al-m'lSha'bidhin).< This combination is understandable
when one reads Ibn a1-J awzi's description of the characteristics of
members of this class in a treatise written about them at roughly the
same time. There are amongst these people some who paint their
faces with an manner of herbs in order to give themselves an
ascetic appearance through its yellow colouring; others use smelling
substances, in order to be able to shed tears at will; others even go to
the lengths of throwing themselves from the pulpit-which con-
trary to custom they decorate with coloured rags, or, departing
from the ways of oriental orators, they produce their false pathos
through ail kind of gestures, by pounding the pulpit, running up and
down the steps, stamping their feet, etc. Others concentrate by
elegant dress and smooth movements on attracting the women,
thereby becoming the cause of frequent mischief.'
This arrogant appearance was matched by the contents of their
sermons. Whereas the 'story-tellers' of the earlier period had gained
the indulgence of pious theologians by the morally and religiously
edifying contents of their lectures, the street preachers of later times
profaned religious subjects by using them for entertainment and
amusement of their audiences; they tried to inlpress the uneducated
populace with piqnant etymologies' and other charlatanisms, and
endeavoured to give themselves an air of engagingin serious research.
Biblica11egends embroidered with ail kinds of anecdotes were the
characteristic contents of their lectures. They loved to tell invented
stories about biblical persons, and the branch of the Isra'iliyyat-
legends of persons in Israelitic tinles, which also penetrated into
more serious exegetic works'-found its most eager promoters here.
In this field too they endeavoured to attract and please by frivolous
exhibition of curiosities, giving themselves the appearance of being
initiated into the most intimate details of sacred history. They left
no question unanswered because it would have damaged their
1 From p. 182, 4 from below: wa.minna'Z-na'iltu'Z-mubk!, we learn that they
also concerned themselves with lamentations for al-l;Iusayn.
2 Cf. ZDMG, XXXVI, p. 28r, note I.
3 Yattmatal-Dahr. III,p. I82, ult.
AZ-MathaI al-So'ir, p. 35-
5 Ibn al-Jawzl, fols. 101-6.
• Cf. Yaqnt, I, p. 293: II, p. 138.
'i'Itqan, II, p. 221, tawiirikh Isya'iliyya.
THE I;IADiTH AS A MEANS OF EDIFICATION I57
reputation before the populace if they had admitted their ignorance.
A for example, was able to give the name of the golden calf,
and when asked from what source he had gathered this knowledge
he gave 'the book of 'Amr b. al-'As' as the source of his learning.
1
Another knew exactly the name of the wolf whic1l had eaten Joseph.
When it was pointed out to him that Joseph had not been eaten by
a wolf, he escaped from his predicament with the answer: Well, then
it was the name of the wolf who did not eat Joseph.
2
They met learned theologians who exposed their inlposture with
similar pressure of mind. It is easily understood that professional
theologians became their sworn enemies; since people everywhere
streamed to the 'story-teller', much as, above, we saw it happen in
Ba"ra, and their lectures were much better attended than those of
trained theologians, who thus saw dangerous rivals in the story-
tellers. By means of tricks such as we have just seen these latter
endeavoured to be regarded as 'scholars' in the eyes of the people,
and they were more highly respected than professional theologians.
Abu I:Ianifa's mother sought advice about a religious question. She
first approached her famous son, but was not satisfied with his answer
and made him accompany her to the story-teller Zara'a, and only
when this man confirmed Abu I:Ianifa's judgement in his presence
did she rest content.
3
But not all were so deferential to
scho!ars as Zara'a. Usuaily they met theologians
WIth great sang jrmd, and the laugh was usually on their side. We
have already had examples of this and many conld be added.
This mutual relationship also appears in a number of anecdotes to
which it gave rise. The traditionist al-Sha'bi (d. I03), it is said,
noticed one Friday in Palmyra that all the people gathered round an
old man with a long beard and took notes of his lecture. Amongst
other things he spoke, prefacing his words with long isniid going back
to the Prophet, of the two trumpets of the day of judgement. Two
blasts would be given on these trumpets: one wonld prostrate
everyone into lifeless stupor and the other blast would wake them to
a new life. The traditionist could not bear this falsification of
Koranic eschatology and reprimanded the story-teller for having
made two trumpets out of one. But the latter replied: 'You evil-
doer, how dare you deny what I have on the authority of a correct
traditional chain from the mouth of the Prophet?' He then picked up
his shoe and gave the signal to beat al-Sha'bi, and his audience,
taking the hint, did not stop beating him until he swore that God
had created thirty trumpets. < Even though this tale may not be
historical it nevertheless illustrates the relationship of learned
1 p, 356; al.'Iqd, II, p. 151; cf. also al-Mas''O.di, IV, pp. 23, 26.
t Ibn al-Jawzi, fo1. I2g.
a Ibid.• fo1. I24. .. Ibid., fo!. 107_
[168]
IS8 VOLUME TWO: CHAPTER 5
i
' theologians to story-tellers and the role of the populace in the many
encounters of these two classes. Mul;lammad b. J arir al-Tabari came
into a similar situation because of his energetic proceeding against a
lying story-teller. A qii" preached to the populace about all manner
of nonsense. Among other things he explained the words of the
Koran (11'81) by saying that God had made room for Muhammed
upon His throne next to Him. When al-Tabari heard of this un-
Islamic doctrine he thought it his duty to protest against such
heresy and even wrote upon his front door: 'Praised be God who
needs no company and has no one sitting on His throne with Him.'
When the Baghdad mob saw this inscription directed against their
favourite street-theologian, they besieged the house of the much
respected Imam and threw stones against the door so that the
entrance was blocked with stones.
1
From all this it will be seen that the existence and effectiveness
of such a class of preachers represented a real danger to the integrity
of the !)adlth and that their irresponsibility had a large share in the
invention and' circulation of false traditions. In early times these
preachers were largely to be found in 'Iraq and further towards
Central Asia, whereas there were fewer of them in the I,Iijaz. It is
reported that Malik b. Anas forbade them to appear in the mosques
of Medina." They were also fairly rare in the Maghrib, an area where
a strict adherence to tradition predominated.' The falsification of
tradition by these people differs from the methods previously
[169] described in that the qu"ii, had no political, religious or party bias
in mind, but they were merely concerned with the edification and
entertainment of their listeners and, it may be added, the material
gains which they derived from their activity among the common
people. Since they were particularly out for material gain, there was
of course professional jealousy amongst them. 'The qii" does not
love the qii:;:;' is a proverbial saying.- Collection of money appears
always to have been the aftermath of such street preaching; at
least it would seem so from the report which was later ascribed to
the companion 'Imran b. I,I$. The latter passed a qii" who begged
from his audience after his recitation from the Koran. 'Imran
quoted this word of the Prophet when witnessing the scene: 'He who
reads the Koran should thereby invoke God, but there will come
people who will use the Koran as an opportunity for begging."
1 AI-Suy'llti. Taltdhfr al-KhawaH (Leiden Ms., Warner, no. 474), fols. 46-79.
Cap. VII.
2 Ibid., Cap. IX.
3 AI-Muqaddasi, p. 236, 18.
" Yatt:mat al.Dahr, III, p. 3, 17 [al-Mayda-ni, II, 304].
Ii Al.TirmidhI, II, p. 121. In Ibn aI-Jawzi, fols. 147-9 very interestin g
examples are quoted.
-.;;;l
THE J;fADITH AS A MEANS OF EDIFICATION I59
Kawwaza was the term used to denote this special form of collecting
money; the person who was charged with the collection was called
mukawwiz (add to the dictionaries) and how artfully these collections
were made can be seen in a description from the fourth century.'
The ordinary people had such faith in the qu"ii, that they were
even used for saying prayers; a father makes a qii" pray for the
return of his son-for payment of course? These people appear also
to have been busy with a kind Qf trade in indulgences in the fifth
century.s
Even in modern times there could be found such freelance prea-
chers in Muslim cities. - Schack in his diary from Damascus in
18
7
0
says: 'The most interesting thing was a characteristic scene which I
witnessed (in the Umayyad mosque). A sheikh leaned against a
pillar, holding forth with liveJy gesticulations, in the midst of a
large audience surrounding him. My guide said that he was no
clergyman but a man from the people who preached edifying
sermons to the worshippers and collected money for this.' Schack
is reminded by this scene of Abu Zayd, the hero of the M aqiimas
of al-I,Iariri,' and in fact the XLI Maqama describes corresponding [170]
s ~ e n : s (the preacher of penitence and the boy collecting money in
Tmms, partly also the XI, where Abu Zayd preaches a moralistic
sermon at the cemetery and then collects money from bystanders.).
v
Yet another sort of imposter must be mentioned in this context.
This will showthat Joseph Balsamo had predecessors some centuries
~ e f o r e him in Asia. We are referring to the mu'ammarin," the long-
hved ones. They belong to the chapter of the inner history of the
!)adlth, for the adventurers called mu'ammarin recited traditions
from direct contact with the Prophet. In this they had an easier
task than other inventors of !)adiths, who also had to invent an
isniiil which brought their saying into contact with the Prophet.
The 'long-lived ones' pretended to be 'companions of the Prophet'
and therefore had no need to devise connecting chains between
their information and Muhammed's communication. Thus they
escaped fault-finding criticism if they were fortunate in obtaining
]. YatEmat ai-DaM, III. p. 178,2.
• Yaqet. II. p. 123.
3 Ibn al·Jawzi, fo1. rI 5.
• E.g., for BUkhara, Petermann's Geogr. Mitteilungen, r889. p. 26ga.
5 Ein kaibes Jakrhundert. Erinnerungen u. Au/zeicknuncen. III, p. 191.
• Ed. de Sacy, 2nd ed., p. 129.
7 [Goldziher wrote a monograph on the mu'ammarun, as an intrOduction to
his edition of Abi11;Iatim al.Sijistani's book on the SUbject: Abhf,lndlungen ZUY
arabischen Philologie, II, Leiden, 1899.J
F
[171]
160 VOLUME TWO: CHAPTER 5
credence for their claim of having had personal contact with the
Prophet. We shall see that they often succeeded in finding gullible
audiences for their swindle.
The quality of extraordinary longevity a motive which is
mentioned without a theological context III fables about Arab antI-
quity. The poet and tribal hero Zuhayr b. Janab is made to attain
45
0
years of age, his grandfather is reputed to have lived 6?0 years.
1
One of the heroes of the 'Antar cycle, Durayd b. aI-$nnma aI-
Khath'ami, is according to the fable, at the tin1e with whicl1 the
SIra deals, already 450 years old and he continues to for quite a
while since he lived till the epoch of the Prophet" It IS true that he
described hin1self in a poem dating near the Islamic period as an
old man 'between ninety and a hundred years'." At that age the
millstone of wars' (raba at-barb), as he was called, was a broken old
man, the object of the special care of the tribe
highly. The fabulous idea of longevity is often WIth III traditIons
about the heroes of the Jahiliyya," and philolog1Sts have collected
the material for this chapter of ancient Arab traditions.
5
Such
traditions, preserved thanks to the philologists, much em-
broidered by popular hyperbole and the Arab audiences were.thus
conditioned to listen to communications such as the one WhICh a
later raw; of the 'Antar romance was able to tell to his audience
without being laughed at. According to him one of the transmitters
of the legends of the 'Antar cycle, aI-'Ao;ma'i, reached the age of
67
0
, of which 400 years were spent in the tin1e of the Jahiliyya.· This
waS to compensate for the anachronism that the rawi had been
acquainted with the subjects of his stories as an eyewitness. The
story-teller of Mu'awiya, 'Abid b. Shariya, also reached 300 years
of age, according to legend.
7
1 Agh" XXI, pp. 99, 4; lOa, 20 [Th. WZKM,
18
9
6
, p. 354: G.
] acob, Arabisches Beduinenleben, 2nd ed.• p. XlX,]
Sirat 'Antar, VI, p. 73; VIII, p. 20; XX. pp. !I4. 143; d. III, p. 3·
3 Agh., IX, p. 12, 21.
'Philologists and historians of literature count, however, .among th:
people who reached the age of 120--150 years (Sman b. Abl
I:Iaritha reached 150, al.A'lam to Zuhayr. ed. Landberg, rural. p. 175, 7).
Agh., IV, p. 3, 7· _ .
6 The book most often quoted is the K. al·Mu'ammar£n by Aba I;iatim al-
Sijismni (d. 255) from which there are many extracts in the Khizanat al--4
dab
.
[It has already been pointed out that this book was subsequently pubhshed
by Goldziher himself.]
6' Sirat 'Anfar, VI, p. 138; d. ZDMG, XXXII, p. 342; Wellhausen, Pro·
legomena mY Geschichte Israels, 3rd ed., p. 37
8
.
7 Ibn al-Kalbi, in al-I;iariri, Durrat al·Ghawwas, ed. Thorbecke, p. _55.
penult. [The correct form of the name is 'Ubayd b. Sharya, cf. Goldzlher,
Abhatwungen, II, pp. 40ft of the Arabic text, pp. 29:ff. of the notes; See also
GALSI, p. 100.]
THE Ij:ADITH AS A MEANS OF EDIFICATION X61
Arising from popular fable, belief in the existence of mu'ammarin
entered the religious field. What in fable was assumed as a possibility
in ancient tin1es, religious sentin1ent of the people made into a true
fact concerning contemporaries. The earliest trace of this type of
mu'ammarin, who used their alleged gift of grace for irresponsible
Qadith stories (I.e., not subject to isnad), is to be found at the end of
the third or begim1ing of the fourth century. A certain 'Uthman b.
aI-Khattab, with the nick-name Ibn Ahi'l-Dunya (d. 327), pretended
to have known 'Ali personally and a scroll of traditions of whic1i he
was the author was handed down by many people.
1
Not long afterwards, in the year 329, we hear amongst the
Andalusian Muslin1s of a certain Mano;iir b. whose father was
said to have been a mawlii of the Prophet, and Mano;iir himself
claimed to have been a boy whilst 'Uthman and 'Nisha were still
alive" A younger contemporary, Ja'far b. Nestor aI-Rfunl, who made
capital out of the credulousness of the masses in the district of
Farab about the year 350, went even farther. He said in one of his
stories: 'I was in the Prophet's company at the battle of TabUk
when he lost his riding whip. 1 dismounted, fetched the whip and
handed it to the Prophet who rewarded me with the words: 'May
God extend your life.' Thus 1 am alive 320 years after this blessing,'"
he concludes. India and Central Asia appear to have been the chief
scenes for the operations of such in1postors. A prince Sarbatak from
India is mentioned who, at the elleged age of 725 years, pretended
to have been the Indian prince to whom the Prophet had sent his
missionaries. He claimed to have seen the Prophet twice, in Mecca
and in Medina. He is said to have died in the year 333 aged 894
years." The book of Ibn I:Iajar al-'Asqalani on the 'Companions of
the Prophet' is rich in material on such alleged Companions.
5
The
credulous people could be expected to believe such things as the
following: The caliph aI-Nao;rr met in the year 576 a small Arab
tribe on one of his hunting expeditions to the desert. Its oldest
members waited upon the caliph, kissed the ground before him and
offered him what food they could produce. Then they said: '0
Commander of the Believers, we own a treasure which we should like
1 Ibn VIII, p. 126, A.H. 327. [New materials about him in
kandlungen, II, pp. lxvii-viii; he is sometimes called 'Ali b. 'Uthman b. al-
Khatlab.]
I AI.Maqqarl, II, p. 6. where other such phenomena are also described.
S Ibn aajar, I, p. 549. [For further reierences see Abhandlungen, II, p.
LXVIII.]
.( Ibid, II, p. 354. [Further references in Abhandlungen, II, p. lxxv where
there is added yet another example from the fifth century. Mu'amuras al-

5 Ibid., I, p. 538, the poem by ]ahma b. 'Awf al.DawsI, where he sings of his
own longevity (he was 360 years old).
[172]
I62 VOLUME TWO: CHAPTER 5
to offer to you as a gift. We are all the sous of a mau who is still with
us though he is a contemporary of the Prophet and helped in making
the "ditch". His name is Jubayr b. al-I;Iarith.' The caliph asked for
the old man to be shown to him and he was brought in a cradle.
1
About the same time a $ufi by the name of al-Rabi' b. MaJ:.unud
from Mardin indulges in the same sort of swindle: he claimed in the
year 599 that he was an immediate Companion of the prophet.
2
The most extravagant swindler of this kind was however an Indian
[173J Muslim called Ratan b. Abd 'Allah who died in the year 632 (709
according to others).- He claims that he was already sixteen years
old when he, the pagan, had a revelation by a vision of the Prophet's
appearance in I;Iijaz. He made long and wearisome journeys to see
the chosen man and it was granted to him to carry in his arms, on
the way between Jidda and Mecca, Muhammed, who was then but a
small boy. As a reward for this he was chosen by providence to
become a Muslim Methuselah. He spread about three hundred
traditions which he claimed to have obtained from the Prophet
himself.' Amongst these are sayings which are obvious in their Shi'ite
bias, e.g. one on the merits of mourning on the day of 'Ashura. This
Ratan impressed many of the most learned men of his time, who
believed his fables. Ibn I;Iajar lists a number of scholars who came to
India from various parts of the Islamic world, even from Spain,
especially to see this man. Al-Kutubi preserved the description by a
Muslimfrom Khurasiin, who visited Ratan in India, of his discussion
with him.' Ratan's son Ma1;lmud became, after the death of the
remarkable old man, a source of elaborations on the fables of Baba
Ratan.' He told of his father that he was present at the split-
ting of the moon, at the 'Battle of the Ditch', and at other famous
events of tlte epoch of the Prophet.
Scholars like the great lexicographer Majd al-Din al-Shirazi,
the author of the Qamus, and the famous Khalil al-$afadi believed in
the possibility of Ratan's role and as a companion defended him in
the literature against al-Dhahabi who, proceeding from the dogma
that none of the Prophet's companions survived the first century,
took the trouble to contest the legend of Ratan in a special treatise
Kasr wathan Ratan (the destruction of the idol of Ratan). 'He who
believes in this miracle of the world and is convinced that Ratan
, Ibid, I, p. 543.
'Z. Ibid, I, p. r08s.
S [See the detailed study by J. Horovitz, 'Baba Ratall, the saint of Bhatinda,'
JPHS, II, pp. 97:ff., and M. Shafi"s article <Ratan' in El, Suppl.]
4. Here belong probably the A (uidith Rataniyya, Leiden MS., Warner no.
957(5), Cat. IV, p. 101; Ahlwardt, Ber!. Cat. II, p. 184, no. 1387; p. 214, no.
1486 [and a Ms. in Lucknow, see Horovitz,I.e. p. IIZ].
So Fawat alkWafayiit, I, p. 162.
6 Ibn l:iajar, I, pp. 1086-1106.
THE !;!ADiTH AS A MEANS OF EDIFICATION 163
has lived all this time cannot be cured. Let him know that I am the
first to deny it. Ratan was an old swindler, a dajjal, a liar, who
fobbed off the people with enmmous lies and thus perpetrated a
mischievous infamyl May God punish him.'l Ibn I;Iajar also fought
this pious lie in his detailed discussion of the Ratan fables and their [174J
literature: 'Ratan himself was a great liar, but not content with that
people liberally invented lies and absurdities about him.''--At
about the same time a swindler named Abu'l-Hasan al-Ra'i was
active in Turkestan. He also maintained in the seventh century that
he was a long-lived companion of the Prophet and said that he lifted
the Prophet up in the night when the moon split for his sake.
Though prudent traditionists put such people without hesitation
on the list of forgers, or as they call them, dajjals, _they themselves
were well able to play on the credulousness of men, as the example
of Ratan showed. Such pretence brought great advantages, as to be
a Companion of the Prophet was the highest dignity obtainable.
The person and honour of such people were considered untouchable,
and to slight them would have been considered a capital crime.
1 Al-KutUbi, op_ cit., p. 163.
S Ibn l;Iajar, IV, p. 88.
S See above, p. 127. note 8.
[175] CHAPTER SIX
TALAB AL-HADiTH
. .
I
I N the beginning of its development the l).adith had local character.
It had its origin in Medina and from there was carried to all the
provinces of Islam. On the other hand there is a large part of it which
developed independently in the provinces. The pious in all lands
circulated sayings of the Prophet, partly such as were current as
prophetic teachings at the cradle of the sunna and partly such as
only developed in the provinces in support for some doctrine which
grew up in particular circles there. The Muslim critics themselves
point out the local character of many l).adiths.
'
If theologians of a
particular province wished to fill the gaps in the tradition of their
home, they had no other recourse but travel to gain the opportunity
of becoming personally acquainted with the l).adiths of other pro-
vinces (sec above p. 42). The form of valid l).adiths which was
sanctioned by custom demanded that the transmitters ([lamala)
of the desired l).adiths had to be visited personally,' in order to be
able to spread sayings obtained from them in their name. The
[176] tradition with its whole isnad was taken over, thus entitling one to
add onc's own name as the last link in the chain of transmitters.
Any other form of taking over traditions was considered abnormal.
It is said with disapproval that Ibn Lahi'a (d. "74) listened to his
pupils reading traditions that he had not collected personally."
In order to possess a tradition in authenticated forms it was neces-
sary to meet those who were its 'carriers'.' 'IraqI scholars liked to
1 A few examples from Abu Dawud: I, p. 10: l;iidhii min sunan aM at.$hiim
lam yashrakhum jthii. al}ad; p. 88: infarada aM p. 175: min sunan aM
alladhi tafarradu bUd; p. 241: l}adith 1,lintSi (that it was forbidden to
fast on Saturdays); II, p. 155: mimma injaYada bihi aM al·Madina (that the
Prophet had fixed no exact punishments-badd-for those who infringed the
prohibition of wine) etc. Different lJadiths are handed on from the same man in
two different provinces and the critics judge them differently. AI·Bukhari
says: Ahl aZSham yarwuna 'an Zukayr b. Mu1}ammad. man(i,Mr wa·ahZ al-
'Iraq yatw$1na 'anhu a1}adUh muqiiraba, al.Tirmidhi, I, p. 60, II, p. 225, I.
2 Abii'l Ma1).asin, r, p. 475, z.
:I Ibn Qutayba, ed. vViistenfeld, p. 253, S.v.
4. 'Abd b. l::Iamid handed down a 1).adith in the name of 'Abd al·Ral;unan
b. Sa'd of Rayy. Yal).ya. b. Mu'In who was present asked: 'Does not <Abd aI-
Ral).man intend to undertake the J;ajj himself so that we may be able to hear
the ];ladith from him?', al.Tirmidhi, II, p. 233, top.
TALAB AL-I;IADITH
make use of tlle pilgrimage to the holy places in order to hear
I.lijazi traditions from the pious men living there;' these traditions
were occasionally different from those current in their homeland,
as we saw before.
Much attention was paid to taking over and then handing down
all that important men transmitted in direct line from them or
from those who could listen to them. Many journeys were undertaken
to satisfy this desire. Al).mad b. Milsa al-JawaJ1qI from Ahwaz
(ZIO-306), usually known as 'Abdan, travelled to Ba,ra every time he
heard of a tradition transmitted by Ayyiib al-Sakhtiyani, in order
to obtain these traditions from men who gathered them inlmedi-
ateIy at the SOUIce. Altogether' he made that journey eighteen
times.'
Religious proverbs and stimulating sayings" praise journeys
fi talab at-'ilm, for the purpose of seeking knowledge, even if the
journey should lead as far as China. By at-'ilm, knowledge, is meant
in such sayings religious knowledge transmitted from really early
times: l).adith and sunna.· To the companion Abil'l-Darda' is attri-
buted this confession (which in effect belongs to a later twe): 'If
the explanation of a passage in the book of God presented me with
any difficulties and I heard of a man in Birk al-Ghumad-an in- [177]
accessible spot in Southern Arabia, which in ancient times was
used proverbially as the furthest end of the Arabian continent'-
who was able to explain this passage, I would not shrink from the
journey there,'- 'He who departs in the search of knowledge is on
"God's path" (saUl Alliih) until he returns,' i.e. he gains the same
merit as he who offers his life in the war of faith;' 'the angels spread
their wings over him and all creatures pray for him, even the fish
in the water.'s
It would be useless to list examples of the great interchange
between outlying provinces which resulted from such journeys of
study. From one end of the Islamic world to the other, from al-
1. Agh., XIX, p. 35, 4- (Sufyan b. 'Uyayna), cf. al.Tirmidhi, II, p. 196 bottom,
'Ali b. al.Madini (d. 234): !J,ajajtu !J,ajjatan wa-Zaysa U kimmatun illa an asma'Q
etc.
2 Yaqiit, I, p. 414.
II Al-TirmidhI, II, p. '269, 19, in connection with the story that someone
undertook the journey to investigate the sunna in respect of the mass al.
khuffayn.
"Ibid., II, p. 160, n: inna hadM'Z·'Um=thls is the sunna, cf. above. p. lIO.
note 4., al·qawl ft'Z-Qur'ani bighayri 'ilmin; N.B. al·Tirmidhi, ibid, p. 25, 19:
by jama'Q is meant: ahZ al-fiqh wa'Z· 'Urn wa'l·l,zadUh.
• Yaqut, I, pp. s8g!.
8 ]az!rat al·'Arab. ed. D. H. Muller, p. 204.
7 Al.Tirmidhi, II, p. 108, cf. Kremer, Cult1!rgesch., II, p. 437.
II Ibn Maja, p. 20. [For the praise of tUm d. also Wensinck, Handbook,
'knowledge' (N.B. not 'science').]
1 Cf. Tab. l:iuff', VII, no. 76; VIII, no. 19: XIII, no. 53, etc.
:z It is obvious that it is an even greater honour to be able to say of some-
one that he is the aim of all journeys of tiilibin from aU countries. Yaqiit I,
p. 694. ult. 'that because of him (Le. to get to him) the arm.pits or livers of
animals are beaten' (tuq,rab ilayhi ft,bat or akbiid at-marly). 'see above, p. 142;
d. Agh., I, p. 34. 3 from below; al-Mubarrad, p. 571, I:2: ruZllat at.dunyii (but
de voyage de tout Ie monde); Ibn Battiita, I, p. 253.
3 Cf. the expression: akha safarin jawwiibu Qnj,in., Agh., I, p. 38, I CUmar
b. Abi Rabi'a).
4 Tab. 1:iuff., X, no. 17; XII, no. 58.
Ibid., IX, no. 9.
11 Ibid., VI, no. 17: VIII, no. 2I.
7 yaqo.t, III, p. 528, 9. [For the extended travels of the traditionist cf
also al.Ghazali, Ilfyii', Book XVII: adCib at-safar.]
Andalus to Central Asia, wandered diligent men gathering traditions
in order to be able to pass them on to their audiences.
'
This was the
only possible way of obtaining in their authentic form traditions
which were scattered in the most diverse provinces. The honorific
al-ra7;7;iila or al-jawwiil is hardly ever absent from the names of
traditionists of recognized importance.- The title fawwiif al-aqiilim,
wanderer in all zones,' is no mere hyperbole for these travellers, who
included people who could say of themselves that they had traversed
the East and West four times.
4
These men do not travel in all these
countries in order to see the world or to gain experience but only to
see the preservers of traditions in all these places and to hear and
profit by them, 'like the bird who alights on no tree without picking
[178] at the leaves." It is said of these men that they are famed for the
falab,' i.e. for active search and investigation of !)adiths (min al-
mashhurin bi'l-/alabfl'l-ri7;la).'
II
These journeys also yielded important results for the practical
development of the !)adith in Islam. Because of the ever increasing
amount of journeys for the lalab, theologians succeeded in inserting
the particular provinci.aI traditions into the general, more and more
uniform, framework of the !)adith. Without their success the concept
of collections of !)adiths would hardly have been possible. The third
century is the time when the distinction of local traditions begin to
have only theoretical importance for criticism; they are all-provided
that their isnads are unimpeachable-incorporated into the corpus of
traditions and all are considered of equally binding force. Ouly critics
continue to differentiate the provenance of separate sayings, but
this has no influence npon their position within the system of sources
for orthodox living.
By this eclectic proceeding some points which previously had been
particular to only limited sections of Islam became of more general,
167 TALAB AL-?ADITH
F'
sometimes even overwhelming, importance and made possible the
development of a uniform sunna for the Islamic world in very many,
though not all fields. Before that there could be no question of a uni-
form sunna in Islam.
If we enter the Jami' al-Azhar in Cairo through the 'door of the
barbers' (biib al-mnzayyinin)' the inscription on this gate (against a
background of intertwining arabsques) will attract attention. It
says: Inna' I-a'miila U'I-niyyiiti wa-li-knlli'mra'in mil nawii, i.e.
verily, actions are judged by their intention and every man has
what he has intended. This saying of the Prophet is considered to
be one of the most important principles of Islam. As such it is not
ouly the first of the 'forty traditions' of al-Nawawi (al-Arba'in al-
Nawawiyya) but before that)' it is mentioned as one of the four
basic doctrines around which Islam revolves (madiir al-isliim). [179]
Though the saying originally has a moral import' and measures the
ethical worth of a religious act by its intention,
4
the theologians (who
like to produce a guiding principle from amongst the vast sum of
traditions which usually ouly offer concrete cases and judgements)
have applied this sentence as a supreme principle in the treatment of
religious and legal questions' and have even attached to it a lot of
silly casuistry unworthy of this lofty ethical thought.'
This principle, which rules the whole theory of Law, was not
always known in all Islam (so far as expression in a tradition is
1 Cf. Ebers, Aegypten in BUd u. Wort, II, p. 72.
! Cf. aI·Fashani, at-Majiilis al-Saniyya, p. 5. (allegedly from AbO. Dawo.d);
these four doctrines were epitomized by an Andalusian (5th cent.) in an
instructive epigram (Ibn BashkuwaI, p. 238, no. 541); the niyya traditio:q in a
poem by Abu Ja'far from Elvira (al-Maqqarl, I, p. 928).
3 'Ibis is obvious from the full verSion of the saying which has the addition
that departure abroad is pleasing only in the case of one who has undertaken
it in the name of God, but not of him who intends worldly aims (dunya
buhu).
"AI·MuwaUa', II, p. 2r; inna-llalta qad awqa'a ajrahu 'aUt qadri niYYatihi;
forintentioninjihiid, al.Nasa'i, p. 77; d. al·Darimi, p. 318.
IS The principle is also mainly mentioned in connection with such legal
questions to prove that a legal formula (e.g. manumissio or repudium) is only
of practical consequence if it is uttered With the intention of this result:
B. 'Atq, no. 6, Taliiq, no. II, Ayman, no. 2r, Siyal, no. I, Maniiqibal·AniCir, no.
45. AbO. Dawftd, I, p. 2r8, aI-Nasa:!, I, p. 8, II, pp. 41, 8r; cf. also the teaching
of Ibrahim 'i by which reservatio mentalis is to be excluded by oath,
al-Tirmidhi, I, p. 253, 8 from below. It is quoted in the name of the Imam
al-Shafi'i that the niyya-l}adithis applicable in 70 chapters of law, in Ahlwardt,
Ber!. Cat. II, p. 165, no. 1362. [Cf. also Wensinck, Handbook, s.v. 'intention';
idem, 'Die intente in recht, ethick en mystiek der semitische volken,' in
Verst. Med. Ak. Amst., Ser. 5, IV, pp. 109ft., idem, s.v. 'Niya: in EI.]
o Thus. e.g., it is reasoned that by this principle the intention to redeem a
promise cancels the omission to do so, al-Tirmidb;r, II, p. 105. Such casuistical
applications of tbis principle are to be found in Tahdh!b, p. 729;
IV, pp. 347ff.
VOLUME TWO: CHAPTER 6 166
[180]
r68 VOLUME TWO: CHAPTER 6
concerned). In earlier times it was transmitted in Medina' only and,
as is expressly stated, was known 'neither in lIraq,2 Mecca or Yemen,
nor in Syria or Egypt." Only the eclectic tendency in the use of
traditions of later days caused it to penetrate into the general
hamth and become an authoritative principle of Muslimlegal science.
;Abd al-Rahman b. Mahdi of Ba.era (d. r98) says: 'It would be desir-
able to this sentence in every chapter (bab) of legal teaching."
III
The example of the niyya tradition serves to show the reader how
particularistic teaching of single provinces could become authorita-
tive rules for the whole of Islam through the intercourse which led
to the rise of the collections in the third century. We must say at the
outset that the canonical collections are not critically sorted or
methodically arranged collections of 1;Ladlths which the collectors
selected from existing literature. The 1;Ladlths from which the authors
chose, the many thousands of sayings from which they compiled
those which were valid according to their judgement, had been
brought together by them on extensive travels. Af-Bukhiiri made
of a thousand sheikhs' in all parts of the IslamIC world. It was his
task to investigate their trustworthiness and that of their authorities.
The same is true of the other authorities of the body of traditions
used in the compilations. ' .
The rise of this literature brought no end to independent collectmg,
1 There it seems to have been especially the QaQ.l Ya1;lya b. Satid al-An!?ari
(d. 143) who propagated it and Malik is said to have it from,
al.Tirmidhi, I, p. 310, q. It is remarkable that even m aZ.kfuwat!a th.1S
principle is applied to concrete cases only. There it is not transmitte_d
an abstract form, but it is found with express reference to Ya1,lya b. SatId In
Shaybani, p. 4°1, at the end of Biib The same Shaybani also
mentions the niyya tradition in his work on the law of war, WJL, XL, p. 49,
no. 6 [T. p. 9]. . -
I: According to Abo. I:Ianifa ('Iraqi trend) the niyya is uot requrred for the
validity of manumissio or rcpudium, al-Qa..<;tallani, IV. p. 349.
3 Ibn I:Iibban, in aI.]urja-ni, introduction to al-Tirmidhi (Delhi, 1849).
4. Al-Tirmidhi, I, p. 310, 1+
6 Tahdhlb, p. 93.
6 [AI.Bukha.ri, and the other authors of the canonical. have,
however, also used written sources, on the one hand earlIer compIlatIons of
hadith-of which a number, such as the Jami' of Ma'mar b. Rashid. the
of 'Abd al-Razzaq, and the collection of al-Humaydi, have lately
been partially recovered-on the other, books by philologists. Cf. for these
questions M. F. Sezgin, 'Hadis musannafat inin medbdei ve Ma'mer b. Rasid
'in Cami'i'," Turkiyat XII, pp. 1I5H.; idem, Buhari'nin kaynaklan
hakktnda arashrmalar, Istanbul, 1956; M. Hamidullah, 'Eine Handschrift der
Sunan von Sa'id b. Manso.r, des Lehrers von Muslim: Die Welt des Islams. 1962.
pp. 2Sfl.]
TALAB AL-",ADITH r69
which could only be furthered by !alab journeys. It was not desired
to learn from books only. Books are for practical use; he who
wishes to gain the merit of seeking for the Prophet's words must
hunt these out from 'the mouths of the carriers'. Some of the
examples quoted above relate to the time when many systematical
works were already in circnlation.
AbU 'Abd Allah b. Manda (d. 395), it is related with some exu-
berance, brought back forty camel-loads' of books and notes from [181]
his journeys. Thetitlekhattiim al-ral;l;iilin, 'the ultimate of travellers','
does not mean that this kind of !alab al-l;adith comes to an end with
him, but merely indicates the supreme rank which Ibn Manda
occupies among those practising this kind of study. Until quite late
centuries it is the ambition of the pious Muslim to be a 'bearer of
the 1;Ladith'. This he becomes not by studying the literature but by
obtaining 1;Ladlths at first hand from other 'bearers'.
The more material was piled up of older and younger 1;Ladiths
the more did the zeal for !alab have to concentrate upon exotic
matter. It is therefore not surprising that people who possessed
such exotic traditions, to obtain which others willingly undertook
long journeys with their inevitable toil, did not offer their wares for
nothing out of piety, but maqe a paying business out of their
privileged position of possessing such traditions in a form which
seemed authentic. Already at an early date we find disapproving
remarks about people who used religious teaching as a means to
gain money. 'Ubada b. al-$amit taught the Ahl al-$u:ffa the Koran,
and one of his pupils sent him a bow as his fee. The pious teacher
asked the Prophet whether he might be permitted to accept this
gift with the intention of using it in religious wars. The Prophet is
made to answer: 'If you desire to obtain for yourself a necklace of
hell-fire you may accept the gift." When the teaching of the Koran
began to become a source of maintenance for professional teachers
it did not take long to find authorities for the permissibility of the
acceptance of material reward.'
The handing-down of 1;Ladlths sank to the level of a business
very early. '[alab journeys favoured the greed of those who suc-
ceeded in pretending to be a source of the 1;Ladith, and with increasing
1 For this kind of quantitative definition in literature see BeU"ttge zur
Geschicltte dey Sprachgelehrsamkeit bei den Araber (1873). fase. 3 pp. 39£.
Wiqr ba'!r is in such definitions (cf. Agh., XIX, p. 34, 14; wiqr bukkti, Abi.\'l-
Ma:Q.a.sin, I. p. 535. 7) not always a camel load. Le. as much as a camel can
carry but also the weight of a camel; see Agh., XIX, p. 128. 4. 5.
2 ,[ab. J;luff., XIII. no. 29.
3 Abti Dawfld. II, p. 62; the same phrase in another connection. al-Tirmidhi,
I, p. I24; cf. AhCr.'l.Ma.J;Iasin, I, p. 541, 13; [Ibn Maja, Tijarat; no. 8. ct. also B.
Ijara. no. 16].
4. Cf. proofs in Ahlwardt, BerI. Cat.1 I. pp. 53a and 168b.
[182]
VOL UME TWO: CHAPTER 6
demand sprang up an ever increasing desire to be paid in cash for the
l)adiths supplied. As early as the second century Shu' ba can describe
this scene: I saw [Yazrd b. Sufyan] Abu'l-Muhazzam in the mosque
of Thabit al-Bunani crouching on the floor; if anyone had offered
him but twopence he would have transmitted seventy l)adrths in
return.' We nevertheless met this l)adrth-beggar as an authority on
canonical collections. He claimed to have spent ten years in the
company of Abu Hurayra and to be able to spread the sayings of the
Prophet in his name.' More serious people disapprove, in accordance
with the tradition of earlier times, of the greed of transmitters and
hold forth against those 'who take [payment] for the l)adith of
God's emissary' (ya'khudhUna).3 Even the 'old books' are for this
purpose cited as authorities for this disapproval. 'Allim majjiinan
kamii 'uUimta majjiinan, 'teach for nothing as you were taught for
nothing'; this law is cited with good reason' from those books. 'By
mobs (al-ghawghii')5 are meant those who write down l)adiths in
order to take other people's money:' The theosophist Abu Sulayman
al-Darani lists the writing of l)adrths amongst those things which
materialistic people exploit for their enrichment.
7
All this was the
result of the long journeys which some people undertook in order to
obtain newl)adiths.
Many examples could be found in the history of Islamic literature
of the strange ways in which these travellers hunted out new l)adiths.
AbU'I-Qiisim b. 'Abd al-Warith al-Shirazr (d. 485) on his journey
from Baghdad to Mosul reached a village called $anfiin in 'Iraq
(near 'Ukbara). He spent the night in the local mosque. The next
day Abu Mul)ammad al-$anfinr led the prayer. At the end of them
the traveller approached the Imam and asked him whether he had
heard any l)adiths. AbU Mul)ammad replied that his father had
introduced him to Abu I.!af, al-Kattanr and Ibn I.!abbaba and other
transmitters of traditionists; he had heard a number of things
from them and also owned booklets where he had written them down.
He was very willing to show these books to the traveller. When
looking through them the latter found one which contained all the
1 Ibn Qutayba. ed. Wiistenfeld. p. 252, I.
Z Al.Tirmidhi, I, pp. 194. 241.
II In a!.Khapo-al.Baghdadi fo1. 44a red. Hyderabad, pp. 153-5] these sayings
are collected.
01 This sentence does in fact occur in Rabbinic literature. Talmud, Neaarim,
fo1. 37a, remarks to Deut. 4:5 (I have taught you as Yahweh my God com-
manded me) ma-anI; be-b,innam af altem name be·binnam. Differences are made
between the various subjects of religious teaching.
'Cf. al·Mas'MI, V, p. 87, I.
I AI-DamIrl, II p. 228 (s.v. al-ghawgha').
7 Al.Suhrawardi, 'Awo,rij at.Ma'o,rif. II. p. 8t (ed. on the margin of the
Iby.').
TALAB AL-J.IADITH I7I
traditions of 'Air b. Ja'd (d. 230). AbU'I-Qiisim then read this book
with Abu Mul)ammad. He wrote to Baghdad and told of his dis-
covery; Baghdad scholars then travelled en masse to Sanfiin in
order to get the traditions of 'Ali b. J a'd from the only man who still
preserved them."
In due course journeys of study in search of curiosities degenerate
into a mere sport. Long journeys were made of which the sole aim
to l)adrths, without any understanding for their contents,
snnp:y r:' order to allow the traveller to boast of them and figure in
the <snaa of known sentences. The above-mentioned attacks on
collectors of traditions by rationalists (p. r32) show that this misuse
was in full swing already in the third century. Serious theologians
do not hesitate to draw attention to the swindles which were per-
petrated by certain ignorant receivers and sly-witted transmitters.
This evil reached its peak in thy fifth century. From this century
warnings by two eminent Muslim theologians are preserved and they
afford a deep insight into the circumstances of the collection of
traditions in those days.
One of them is Abu Bakr AJ.unad, called the preacher of Baghdad
(d. 463), who at the time of the decay of his branch of scholarship
felt called upon to put a stop to the prevailing irresponsibility both
in theory and in practice. We have already seen a sample of his
practical activity in this field. As for theory, his work al-Kijiiya fi
Ma'rijat U$al 'Ilm al-Riwiiya is a monument to his zeal in cleansing
the l)adith.' In the introduction to this work he describes in detail
circumstance;; of the science of l)adith in his time. He says that
his were concerned only with amassing I:>adiths
and wntmg down what they have collected without testing the
sources upon which their achievements are based. 'They are satisfied
with the mere name of l)adith and concentrate on writing down all
they But they are ignorant carriers of books,
3
they suffer
great toil, travel, travel to faraway countries and count effort and
nought. They are continually arriving and departing,
nsk therr lives and fortunes, experience fearful terrors, lose their
health, andbecome haggard travelling all the time in order to achieve
longisniids. This is all, they are not out for more. Thus they "carry"
from people whose reliability is not established, they hear from
people who might be barred from giving testimony, they gather
proofs from men who themselves are illiterate and cannot read
what is in their books, who do not know the methods of tradition
and cannot pronounce the name of their own sheikh. Consciously
1 Yiiq1it, III, p. 385.
S In this work are mentioned also earlier monographs by the author--on
various questions of the methodology of tradition.
S See above, p. 132.
[183]
[184]
\ AI-KhatIb aI·Baghdadi, introduction, fols. 2bff. [ed. Hyderabad, pp.
3f t].
z Ibid., fo1. 40a red. Hyderabad, p. 141].
II AI-GhazalI, IlJ,ya', III, pp. 374-6.
they accept traditions from evident sinners and heretics as long as
the form is preserved and there is a lengthy isnad. This leads to
heretics slighting scholars of previons generations and facilitates
their attacks against them: Even more detailed is the description
of the Scorn which people have for the study of ];1adith because of the
ridiculousness of such travellers.' Al- Khatib also characterizes the
direction of their studies: 'Most of the !alib' al-lJadith concentrate
upon the unusual (al-gharib) and not upon well-known things
(al-mashhur). they are best pleased to hear strange stories (al-m,mkar)
not recognized ones (al-ma'ruj)."
Still more vivid is the description by a younger contemporary of
the preacher of Baghdad, the experienced al-Ghazili (d. 505):
'Another sort of scientific vanity is that of people who spend all their
time on the science of tradition, i.e. in the hearing of traditions and
gathering together of variants and far-reaching strange isnads.
Some of them have the ambition to travel in different countries, to
enter into personal communication with the sheikhs in order to be
able to say: I have obtained traditions of X or Y directly, Z I have
seen himself, and I also possess isnads as few other people have them.
These people are but carriers of texts; they pay little attention to
the meanings and contents of what is being transmitted. In that
their knowledge is defective, they are intent only on handing down,
nothing else, and they live in the belief that they have done sufficient
with that .. : This leads to many ridiculous circumstance in the
activities of these allegedly direct collectors of ];1adiths. 'Occasionally
you may see boys in the lecture rooms of learned sheikhs, the
tradition is read, the sheikh drowses off and the listening boy plays
childish games. But he has heard the tradition from the sheikh
and obtains a written certificate of this. When he grows up he then
[185] claims the right to spread this tradition as a link in the chain.
Adults who hear traditions are often little different and do not fulfil
the conditions of listening properly ... If such hearing were to be
enough to pass on the traditions of the Prophet, madmen, babies
in the cradle and unconscious beings who happened to attend the
recitation of traditions would have to be accepted as transmitters."
From these contemporary descriptions it can be imagined what a
fertile field was here opened for braggarts and boasters. If someone
had troubled, as one of the enemies of Ibn Dil;tya (d. 633) did, to
ask those sheikhs from whom travellers brought ];1adiths home, he
might frequently have obtained the same answer as Ibrahim al-
SanhUri obtained from the alleged sheikhs of Ibn Dil).ya that he had
173 TALAB AL-Ji:ADITH
1 p. 178.
Z About such lists, mashyakha or thabt, Landberg in the Catalogue of the
Amin MSS., Ahlwardt, Ber!. Cat. I, p. 54; they are also called mu'jam al-
Shuyf1kh, Sprenger, ZDMG, X, p. 15, bottom. For the extent of such lists al·
Kutubi, Fawiit al·Hlajiiyiit, II, p. 130, may serve as example: the thabt of
al-Qasim b. Mu1).ammad al_Ishbili (d. 739) comprised 24 volumes; cf.
igiizat wa.thubi1t, Ahlwardt's Landberg. Samml. no. 75 = Berl. Cat. I, p. 92., no.
288. Cf. also the 1'158. of the Leipzig Univ. Library described in ZDMG, VIII,
p. 579, 1. iV1asltyakka-works in respect of the extent of traditions comprised
by an authority (masmii'iit) were occasionally vvritten later; thus Qadi 'IyaQ,
vvrote the Maskyakha of other people, Yaql1t, III, p. 529, ult.; IV. p. 37,
penult. [On lists composed by Spanish scholars, who mostly called them
baYnamai, there is an article by 'Abd al.'Aziz al.Ahwari in Majallat }11a'had
al-Maklt#itat alE'Arabiyya, I (1955) pp. 91ff.]
3 Ibn al.Athir, XI, p. 134, A.H. 563.
• Cf. ZDMG. XLI, p. 63.
, [For the ful15tory ct. G. Makdi5i, BSOAS. '956, pp. '3-,6.] Ibn al.Athir
does not speak well of Ibn al·Jawzi altogether, as can be seen from X, pp. 244,
256, XI, p. 167, XII, p. 7r. In the last-mentioned passage he accuses him of
biased spite against non-I;!anbalites.
never visited them.' When we bear in mind what accusations in this
field were levelled by criticism against respected scholars we may
well deduce what tricks were, on the basis of experience, con-
sidered possible. This is reflected in Ibn al-JawzI's judgement about
the journeys of 'Abd al-Karim al-Sam'ani of Marw (d. 563), the
author of the K. al-Ansao. It is reported of this scholar that: 'He
heard many l;tadiths and undertook vast journeys to search for tllem.
He also heard more than anybody else had ever heard. He repeatediy
travelled through Transoxiana and Khorasan, through the mountain
districts, I.fahan, 'Iraq, Mosul, al-JazIra, Syria and many other
countries ... He also made a list of Iris sheikhs, those men from
whom he heard traditions (mashyakha),' and their number exceeds
four thousand." The historian from whom this article about al- [186]
Sam'anI is taken also adds to the biographical details: Abii'l-Faraj
b. al-Jawzi (d. 597), who in some of his works deals with the stigmat-
izing of forgers and forgeries, says of this scholar that in Baghdad
he took a sheikh by the hand and crossed with him to the other bank
of the river Nahr 'IsO. and then announced after their discussion: The
shaykh N. has transmitted to me in Ma Wara'l-Nahr (beyond the
river, the usual name for Transoxiana) etc. Ibn al-Athir calls this
remark of the critic an insinuation in bad taste, as al-Sam'anI
Can be proved to have been in the true Ma Wara'l-Nahr and had
made use of his intercourse with all the great traditionalists living
there. He had no need to carry out the imposture in Baghdad which
was attlibuted to him. His crime in the eyes of the biased Ibn al-
Jawzi was that he had been a Shafi'ite, whereas Ibn al-Jawzi
followed another autholity (Ibn :£:Ianbal) and nobody but the
:£:Ianballte anthropomorphists' found grace in his eyes.
5
VOLUME TWO: CHAPTER 6
172
Whatever we may think of the accusation of Ibn al-Jawzi, it
can serve as an instructive indication that at that time much im-
posture and false boasting occurred (both formally and materially)
in respect of journeys to collect traditions and of the exploitation
of the material gathered. Many an Abu Zayd al-Sariiji is likely to
have posed as a gatherer and transmitter of !.Jadith on adventurous
journeys as a mendicant.
1 \Viistenfeld, Die Academien der Araber una ihre Gelehrten, p. 69. From a
communication of M. Hartwig Derenbourg I gather that' Abd al·Basit (Cat.
Bibl. Nat., Ms. no. 2788, fol. 4b) lists the teachers of the school up to his time.
[See trans1. H. Sauvaire, 'Description de Damas/ lA, I (1894), pp. 280-2.
The ruins of the' building are described by J, Sauvaget in Les monuments
ayyoubides de Damas, I (I938), pp. 15ft'., and E. Herzfeld. in Ars Islamica,
IX ('942), pp. 49ff.]
I A contemporary of aI·MaqrlzI was Kamal aI-Din b. Mul?ammad (d. 874).
usually called Imam aI.Kamiliyya (cf. AhIwardt, BerI. Cat., II, pp. 77, 31;
602, 8) who is known in the history of religious literature as the author of a
commentary to the Jl.linhiij ala U$iU by Mss. of this work are listed
in the Cairo Cat., II, pp. 248f. [GALS I. p. 742, no. II].
IV
The sixth century introduced into the scientific life of the Islamic
world an institution which might have been destined to push into the
background those lalab journeys of the tendencies and excesses of
which we have just spoken. Up to now there had been no special
schools for the science of the !.Jadith. Systematic teaching was
chiefly confined to the practical fiqh and its maahiihib; the !.Jadith
had to be obtained in travels. The very first high school for !.Jadith
science (aar al-l;taaith) owes its establishment in the sixth century
to the pious Niir al-Din Ma!.Jmud b. Abi Sa'id Zengi (d. 569), who
immortalized his name in Damascus by establishing the Niiriyya
academy which was destined to be a aar at-l;taaith, a specialist high
school for the science of tradition. The author of the monograph on
the old residence of the caliphs, Ibn 'Asakir, was called upon to lend
glamour to the new school through the fame of his learning.
1
Only a
few decades later Nur al-Din's foundation inspired the Ayyiibid
prince aI-Malik al-Kamil al-Din in Egypt to imitate it.
In 622 he established in Cairo a aar al-l;taaith on the pattern of the
school in Damascus, and the former teacher of the prince, Abii'l-
Khattab ibn Di!.Jya, was summoned as its first professor. But
because of political circumstances, which were not suitable for the
continued existence of such institutions, it decayed after a short
blossoming. In the ninth century, according to al-Maqrizi, whose
judgement is probably tinged by partisan prejudice,- the chair of
Ibn Di!.Jya was occupied 'by a youth who had only outward appear-
ance in common with men but couldbe distinguishedfrombeasts ouly
T ALAB AL-J>ADiTH I75
by his ability to speak; this went on until lectures at this school
pretty well ceased." Four years after the Madrasa Kamiliyya (626)
a new aar al-l;taaith arose, also in Damascus, the Madrasa Ashra-
fiyya,2 whose activity was inaugurated by the appointment of Ibn
al-$ala!.J al-Shahrazurl, author of the much read introduction to the
sciences of tradition.· Al-Nawawi alsowas a professor at this academy.
None of these !.Jadith academies lasted for very long,. since they [1881
only served the science of Islam, whereas for making a living men
turned to the study of fiqh, which provided training for official posts
and functions. But such schools did not satisfy the thousands of
eager students of tradition either. They were not suited to appease
the hunger of the liilibin for theIJ1selves collecting the sacred mater-
ial. One had to hear from hundreds of sheikhs and this the aar
al-J;.ailith with its famous professors was not able to replace. Thus
these once famous schools ceased to exist; the spirit of late Islam no
longer had the living power to maintain them and to profit by them. 6
v
In this context we must say a few words about the ijaza system in
Islam. This was an institution within literary life which in its noIDlal
, Al-Maqrlzi. Khilal, II, p. 375.
ZWustenfeld, I.e. [Sauvaire, op. cit., pp. 271-3 where the date 628 is given].
" Under the title of . Ulam al-8adUh (H. Kh., IV. p. 249). Mss. of the work
in the Cat. ay. By. Mus. nos. 1597. 1598 (p. 721b f.); Univ. Library. St Peters.
burg, no. 120, under the title of U$iJl al-QadUh (Baron V. Rosen) [GAL, I,
pp. 440f£., S I, pp. 6IOff.] How popular and how much used thisisagogic work
was is best seen from the circumstance that it was made the subject of detailed
studies and that compendia and even versified editions were repeatedly made of
it. This literature is dealt with in detail in Ahlwardt, Berl. Cat.. II, pp. 6ft,
nos. 1037-48, of. pp. 16ff., nos. 1064-8 [see now GAL l.c., also for some of the
following items]. An epitome by 'Ala' al·Baji (d. 714) is mentioned by
al-Kutubi. Fawiit al-Wajayat, II, p. 75, the compendium by Badr aI-DIn
(d. 733) Cat. Br. Mus. Ms. no. 191, II, by 'Imad al·Din b. Kathir
(d. 774), Houtsma, Cat. Brill, II, p. '32, no. 782, the versification by the Syrian
qa¢i al·qu¢al Mu\1ammad b. Sa'ada (d. 693), ibid, p. ,82, by 'Abd a!·Ra\1rnan
['Abd al-Ralfim in Brockelmann] aI-KurdI (d. 806), in Wustenfeld, op. cit.,
p. 103· Al-Mughalta'i (d. 762) wrote correcting glosses under the title I$liilt Ibn
which were followed by studies by later authors (Cat. ar. Br. Mus.,
Ms. no. 1598).
4. Apart from the above-mentioned dur al-1}adUh there were also several
others in Damascus; a list of them is in Michael Meshaka's 'Cultural Statistics
of Damascus; a list of them is in Michael Meshiika's 'Cultural Statistics of
Damascus', transl. and ed. by Fleischer, ZDMG, VIII, p. 356=Kleinere
Schrijten, III, p. 318 [and Sauvaire, op. cit. pp. 271ff.]. Most of them, however,
are of no importance and left little trace in the history of Islamic scholarship.
[For the dt7.Y al-kadith d. also J. Sauvaget. Les perles choisies d'Ibn ach.
Ckihna. pp. 133-4, and the section 'Origin and diffusion of the Madrasa' in
J. Pedersen's article 'masdjid' in theEI.]
r; Cf. Kremer's Aegypten, II, p. 275.
VOLUME TWO: CHAPTER 6
174
[187]
I76 VOLUME TWO: CHAPTER 6
form as well as in its excesses is a speciality of Muslimsociety and has
no analogy in any other circles. In general we may refer to tl]e data
which Sprenger has collected and the discussion added to it.! A
wide view of the ijaza system can now be obtained from the rich
material which the Royal Library in Berlin has collated from this
field of Islamic studies, and from the instructive work which Ahl-
wardt has done on this part of the collection in a special book of his
Catalogue under the title 'Course of studies and teaching letters.'2
[189] Ijaza became a surrogate for those Muslims who were eager to
obtain hadiths but either did not think long journeys convenient
or they did go on talab travels were not able to stay long
enough in the home town of the 'carrier' of the l;tadiths to receive
them directly from him. This surrogate was to enable them, without
prolonged direct intercourse with the sheikh, to take over l;tadiths
from him and to spread them in his name. They obtained the
sheikhs permission (ijaza)S to hand down a l;tadith as if they had
picked it up from this in verbal form, when in fact they had ouly
received, or even only shown him, a booklet containinghis traditions.
A transition from the verbal passing on of traditions to the form of
iiaza is to be found in a form of communication called
(handing over). Instead of giving a definition of this type of trans-
mission we will give an example which includes the characteristics
of the munawala. Malik b. Anas used to present his pupils and hearers
with a collection of written texts, which he had tied in a bundle, and
say: Here are the texts that I wrote down, corrected and spread with
reference to my predecessors; go then and spread them in my name.
He permitted them to use the term 1}addathana for traditions re-
ceived in this manner, as if they had been orally communicated word
for word.' Milik was not alone in his time in having this concept
of handing down traditions. It is reported of Abu Bakr ibn Abi
Sabra, Abu Yusuf's predecessor in the office of judge (d. I62), that
he copied for Ibn Jurayj a thousand good traditions which he
possessed and that Ibn Jurayj was permitted to spread them with
the formula 1}addathana without their having been read out by
either of them.' The full validity of munawala appears not to have
1 ZDMG, X, pp. gif.
t Vol. I, pp. 54-95. cf. also Houtsma, Cat. Brill, 1889, pp. 134ft, nos. 795-
805·
S The author of the :Mltimal ft'l-Lugha, Abn 1.1:Iusayn b. Faris, offers an
artificial explanation of this term (quoted by aI-Khatib aI·Baghdadi, foI. 8sa
red. Hyderabad, p. 312) Taqrib, fo1. 4gb [naw·24. trans!. JA, IOgI, xvii, pp.
210-7] in explaining it as a metaphor: istaJaztuhu wa'ajaziimi=I have asked
someone for water ('ef.jawaz ai-ma') to water my animals and fields and he has
supplied me with water; the #lilib al-'ibn demands in the same the commun-
ication of traditions, and their owner 'waters' himlikewise.
... Notes to Ibn Hisham, II, p. lIS.
Ibn Qutayba, ed. Wustenfeld, p. '246.
.....
-,",""",,
T ALAB AL-I):ADITH I77
been generally recognized in early times, as al-Bukhari' feels called [190]
upon to justify its validity in a special paragraph of his collection
on the basis of the sunna of the earliest times.
Ijaza goes beyond the liberality of munawata by a further step.
Here the personal presence of the receiver and the bodily handing
over of the copied texts by the raw; is no longer necessary.2 In early
times the later excesses of the manipulation of ijaza had not yet
come to prevail and at least the personal appearance of the recipient
was demanded. The following is a description of how this took place
during the second-third centuries: At that time there livedin Cordova
a man reputed as the faq;h of Andalusia, 'Abd al-M"'alik b. Habib
al-5ulami of Elvira (d. 238), the commentator on the Mu;"a[ta'
amongst whose distinguished pupils is named BaqiS b. Makhlad'
al-Qurtubi. The way in which Ibn l;labib obtained his knowledge of
traditions is shown in a saying by Ibn Wa<;l<;lal;t: "Abd al-Milik
b. l;labib visited me and brought a load of books which he put
before me saying, "This is your contribution to scholarship. Grant
me ijaza to teach it all in my turn." I granted his request, but he
himself has never heard a word from me personally and I have
never lectured to him." In the fourth century it was no longer
generally thought necessary to appear personally in order to receive
an ijaza. Otherwise Abu Dharr al-Harawi (d. 434) would have been
unable to say: 'If ijaza were valid, travelling (al-ril;la) would serve
no purpose." A teacher of this Abu Dharr, a scholar from Saragossa,
Walid b. Bakr al-Ghamri (d. 392), felt called upon to write a treatise
in favour of the admissibility of ijaza as a method of spreading
traditions.
7
At this stage ijaza begins to replace the talab practised in the form [191]
of long journeys to sheikhs, almost completely. In effect in the fifth
century the granting of ijaza in absentia is considered as fnlIy justified
and equal to sima', direct 'hearing'. S The preacher of Baghdad,
1 B. '11m, no. 8.
II Ibn Bashkuwal, p. 577, 6 from below: 'I had conversation with him. in
Bona and he handed over to me (nawalanI) his commentary on the
Later I wrote to him from Toledo and he repeatedly granted me ijaza (ajazani)
for this work; for he had added to it after our meeting.' Nawalant=personal
handing over; ajazanI=handing over in absentia. This example is from the
beginning of the fifth century (405).
3 Taq" in the edition must be altered, in several passages in the text in the
index of names, to Baqt.
, I take this opportunity to correct the form Mukhallicl in my Zdhi"iten,
p. lIS·
• Yaqilt, r, p. 349.
S Ibn Bashkuwal, p. 201.
7 Al·Maqqarl, r. p. 7'4, 4.
8 AI-Fazi, the Mullaclaitlz. lifahan (d. 5'23) Tab. ljufj, XV. no. 42. Conscien.
tious transmitters make manifest the fact that they or their informants
[192]
178 VOLUME TWO: CHAPTER 6
whom we have already mentioned, a man who was certainly not
frivolous iu his handling of the Prophet's traditions, is able to
mention liberality in the manipulation of ijiiza as an undisputed fact.
He says: 'In this sense we have seen that all our sheikhs granted
ijiiza to absent children (U'l'atJiil al-ghuyyab) without asking their
age or ensuriug that they have the necessary powers of understand-
iug (tamy;z). We have, however, not yet seen them grant ijiiza
to unborn children, though anybody who was prepared to go so
far as this would not have acted iucorrectly by analogy." One might
be tempted to regard these words as irony agaiust the iucreasiug
licence. Even the most important men iu Islam from that time on
figure as granters of ijiiza as well as receivers of it in absentia. In this
way Qadi 'Iyad (d. 544)2 obtaiued ijiiza in respect of the work by
Abil Bakr al-Tartilshi (d. 520, author of the Siriij al-MuiUk),a
and Abil Tahir al-Silafi writes from Alexandria several letters asking
al-Zamakhshari, who lived iu Mecca, for a certificate of ijiiza for
all his works.' The father of Ibn Khallikan (seventh century)
writes to al-Mu'ayyad al-Tilsi iu Khurasan iu order to obtaiu an
ijiiza for his son.
5
With this progress of the institution of ijiiza
there are people who hand on material received iu this fashion with
the formula of l;addathanii without specific mention of the fact.'
The value which was placed upon obtaiuiug ijiizas easily led those,
from whom they were requested, to the idea of making the granting
of such permission a means for makiug money. To be sure, material
exploitation of religious knowledge is condenmed theoretically
(see above, p. 170) but the frequent appearance of this question is a
proof that granters of ijiizas did not refraiu from turning the spiritual
goods demanded from them into cash. In the seventh century
Mawhilb al-Jazari (d. 675) had the opportunity to make a special
investigation of this in hii;fatwii collection.
7
From some of the examples mentioned above we were able to see
that ijiiza was sought and given not only for !)adiths but also for
complete literary works. No difference was made whether the book
concerned belonged to the class of religious or profane (e.g. philo-
1 AI-Khatib al-Baghdadi, fo1. 8ga [ed. Hyderabad. p. 326].
2 It is that he also treats theoretically of the validity of granting
ijaza in absentia, Ahlwardt, Berl. Cat. II, no. 1°36, p. 6.
I Al.Maqqari, I, p. 5Ig.
• Ibn Khallikan, no. 72' (VIII, p. 7', ed. Wiistenfeld).
Ii Ibid, no. 762 (ed. Wustenfeld, IX, p. 43).
, Abu'1.Kha11ab b. Dil;>ya (d. 633) in Tab. I;luff., XVIII, no. ,6.
7 AI.Suyflti, Itqan, I, p. 139.
obtained a communication by way of ijiiza in their isnad: akhbaranf N.
ijazatan; Abl1'l.Faraj strictly conforms to this even in regard to
historical data, Agh., VII, pp. II4. I2; n8, 3; II9, 12, 23 etc.

-""'"'-
TALAB AL-1.l:ADITH 179
logical) literature.' The conditions govemiug the dissemiuation of
books took the same form as those obtaiuing iu the use of !)adith
material. A book which one has not made one's own, iu the form of
direct transmission through competent members of a chaiu goiug
back to the author, is only owned as wijiida:' it has been 'found'
but not heard and received iu authentic form. Therefore books-
as we can see any day in good Arabic manuscripts of whatever kiud-
also have sanads like the !):adiths. In the better old manuscripts there
are notes about the lists of teachers and bearers through whose
uniuterrupted mediation the text has passed from the author to the
last owner or user of the work. This therefore was also an opportunity
for the sport of ijiiza. In due course it was part of every educated
Muslim's prestige to own a great number of ijiizas granted by all
sorts of authors iu respect of their own works as well as of works
which they themselves possessed by direct or iudirect ijiizas. From
very simple beginnings' these developed a special ijiiza poetry:
'the permission' which was granted to a person to spread the works [193]
of the mujiz was expressed iu artificial verse.'
This extends into recent times and the extent to which the
widest circles of Islam are seized with thii; craviug for ijiiza is seen
for example in the report that the emir of Waregla asked for an
ijiiza from the traveller al- 'Ayashi, who passed through hii; realm
in the year 1073.' It is understandable that, the more the formula
of ijiiza became meaniugless, the fewer were scruples felt regarding
the circle to which its validity was extended. The traveller 'Abd al-
Ghani al-Nabulilsi grants the mufti of $ayda' an ijiiza not only for
all the works that have already appeared but also for everything
which he would later publish. At the same time there was already
serious discussion of what one was to think of an ijiiza which had not
been granted waking but in a dream.
6
If the reader wishes to follow
1 Examples of such ijazas in Thorbecke's introduction to Durrat al-
p. 14. 7. Derenbourg's edition of the K. at-I'tibtir by Usama b.
Munqidh. p. 168 (see the correction by Landberg, C"itica arabica. II, p. 56),
or Ms. of the Leiden Library, no. ,890(7) Cat. IV, p. 95, Ijaza for
Muslim.
• Cf. Sprenger, lASB, 1856, p. 53.
• Such poems are already common in the fourth century; al-Khatib al-
Baghdadi, £ols. 96& f. quotes such a natm with the date 325. [This seems to be
erroneous; in the printed edition, p. 350. the date refers to a prose ijaza, not
to one o£ those in verse which :follow.]
... Examples in al-Maqqari, I, pp. 628, 715. 743ff. An interesting specimen of
a. general unlimited ijaza in verse is to be found at the end of Ms. D.C. of the
Leipzig Univ. Library, no. 262, cf. Nicoll-Pusey, Badl. Cat., p. 393, to no. 398.
Examples for ordinary ijazas in prose are frequent, e.g. in Khizanat al-Adab, I,
p. 13, Meursinge's Tabaqat at-Mufassirin, p. 79.
I Voyage d' 'Ajdsh£, trans!. Bergbrugger, p. 54.
• ZDMG, XVI, pp. 664, 666, no. 66.
180 VOLUME TWO: CHAPTER 6
up the ijaza system to modem times, he H:fer to the list of
works for which our contemporary al-Ba]ama W1 sought and ob-
tained ijazas. He has devoted a book to this, which he has also had
printed.'

t
!
•
CHAPTER SEVEN
THE WRITING DOWN
OF THE I:IADITH
I
[194]
1 Cairo. I2g8 (Cat. period., no. 404). [For the ijitza cf. also Goldziher's article
in the EI, s.v.]
Up to now we have have chiefly dealt with the !).adith as subject of
tradition. Before considering it as a subject of literature we will
first make some remarks about the written preservation of the
!).adith (kitabat aJ-l;adith) in general.
1
By analogy with Jewish religious literature-written and oral
law-and the idea, prevailing in it, of a prohibition on confiding the
latter to writing.
2
it was wrongly imagined for a long time that inthe
earlier generations of Islam also the view obtained that it was only
the Koran that was destined to be written down and that the !).adith
was to co-exist with it as oral teaching whose writing down had not
been envisaged by its founders. This misleading false analogy, which
also resulted in a number of other erroneous conceptions, was
shown by a thorough investigation of the !).adith to be completely
untenable. Sprenger in his essay (I856) 'Uber das Traditionswesen
bei den Arabem' has provided a mass of material which was of service
in demolishing the superstition concerning the !).adith's original
destiny as oral tradition.
This wrong conception had, however, many theoretical defenders
amongst the Muslims themselves who, contrary to the facts known
to them, had a theological interest in it. In establishing this concept,
the old ra'y schools contributed largely by their endeavour to be
hampered in the free development of the law by as few leges scriptae [195]
as possible. Inthis circle several stories were also invented" to support
their views; the most outstanding of these is a scene at the Prophet's
death bed, where their concept is made quite clear.- This point of
1 [ei. also Goldziher. 'Ka.mpfe von die Stellung des Ijad:ith in Islam:
ZDMG LXI (Ig07). pp. 860fl.]
I See for this Leap. Low, GrapMsche Requisiten und Erzeugnisse bei den
Juden, II, p. 132; Nehem. Briill, 'Die 'Entstehungsgeschichte des
ischen Talmuds als Schriftwerkes,' Jah,rb.fUr judo Gesch. u. Lit., II (
18
7
6
).
:I A report in al-MuwaUa', II, p. 374. also serves for the condemnation of the
writing down of legal norms: 'Umar has a law which he had written down
erased with the words: law ratjiyaka Allah aqarraAa.
• $dhiriten. p. 95.
I82 VOLUME TWO: CHAPTER 7
view was never generally disseminated nor was it accepted at all
times. Otherwise Muslims would not have transmitted reports from
early times from which it is evident that the Prophet himself had
written down some sayiugs outside the Koran and that the writing-
down of non-Koranic sayings of the Prophet had begun quite early.
Muhammed's contemporaries are reported to have made a start in
this. Abu Hurayra once said: 'Nobody can repeat more
from the Prophet than I, unless it be 'Abd Allah b. 'Amr b. al-'A",
for he wrote (them) down
'
but I did not write.'2
Such reports prove that the A,,1).ab al-I;Iadith did not reject the
assumption that, even in the earliest times, sayiugs of the Prophet
had been written down. And in fact we were able to consider in
the first chapter (pp. 22f.) a number of instances evidencing the
existence of of traditions belonging to some of the 'Compan-
ions'. Whatever may be the historical value of such statements, for
they cannot be checked, it must nevertheless be assumed that the
writing of 1).adiths was considered unobjectionable even in the first
century, since we find this an undisputed practice towards the end of
that centnry. We have seen before (p. 47) that the handing down of
tradition on the basis of copy-books was considered natural in the
times of al-Zuhri. Without claiming historical accuracy for the
following report it may be registered in this context that al-Zuhri,
who was famed for his many-sided interest in the various branches
of the knowledge of that time,' surrounded himself constantly with a
[1961 large number of kutub and that, so surrounded, he neglected friends
and family; so that it is told of the wife of this bookworm that she
made the characteristic remark: 'Verily, dear husband, I find these
books harder to bear than three co-wives." If we hear of kutub
(books) in the old days, this certaiuly does not mean books in a
literary sense, but scripta, notes in general, perhaps collectanea,
collections of sayiugs, which a reverent Muslim had heard at various
times and had written down for the sake of greater accuracy, for his
private use.
5
Without hearing or reading out the J:tadiths oneself, the
contents of a were simply taken over in writing and treated
as validly transmitted material.· Such were also the kutub which
1 Seven hundred o-aditions were traced back to him, of which only 17 are
in the two $altfQs, in B. only 8, in M. only 20; thus at the most only 45 of 700
traditions are to some extent-if even merely formally-fairly authentic.
S Tahdhib, p. 361.
3 This is indicated by a saying of Ibn AbI Zinad: We wrote down only
sunna. but al.Zuhrl wrote everythi.ng. If information was needed I couId
always be sure that he had the most comprehensive knowledge of all men; al-
Bayiin, fa!. 1320 [II, p. 290].
" Abulfeda, Annales, I, p. 456.
6 C£' data in Sprenger, Mo1;ammad. III, pp. xcivff.
I Ibn Qutayba, p. 246, 8, in reference to the first half of the second century.
THE WRITING DOWN OF THE J.!ADITH I83
Allah Lahi'a (d. I74 in Egypt) had collected and whose
loss m a fire 1S so much lamented in Muslim accounts because after
this catastrophe, 'Abd Allah's commuuications which iacked
written foundation, were not as trustworthy as based on his
lost collectanea.' Malik b. Anas taught his pupils from written texts
the hearer read them and Malik made corrections and
G;aduall! the.expression, 'write after him' becomes synonymous
Wlth 'he IS a rehable authority."
II
All same it cannot be denied that, despite its general practice,
the wntmg down of 1).adiths had its opponents. This dislike of writing
not there from, the beginning, but was the result of prejudices
which arose later. Abd al-Ral,unan b. Harmala al-AslamY (d. I45)
to get special permission from his teacher Sa'Yd b. al-Musayyib to [197]
wrIte down the J:tadiths that were told to him because his defective
memory :n.ad: him unable t.o retain them accurately word by word. <
But traditlOillstS' who aVOIded 'paper and book" at that time and
also later, were the exception rather than the rule. '
The quarrel, which did not affect the practice, Whether
the ];ladlth :n"ght be only as the subject of memory (!til.),
Or It was to wnte it down, continued well beyond
the tlffie whe,; slft.ed collections of traditions were already
avaJ!able, whIch Wlthout difficulty attained the rank of canonical
texts. Even then there were partisans and cultivators of oral learning
a:,d preservation of the In the same manner as, for some
time the .state press m Biiliiq and other presses in the Islamic
countnes had 1ssued the most important texts of Islamic stUdies in
print, the c.onservative and mujffwir,n at the mosque of al-
Azhar contmued to use theIr yellowed manuscript books in lectures
and study, so there were people who, even after the diffusion of
written had prevalence, did not give up the old
method of learnmg tradItIOns; this may have been because they
felt the need to be taught orally by authorities who could refer to an
uninterrupted chain of informants, or because theylooked at this as a
1 Tahdhlb. p. 365.
Z An example i,5 be fa.und in Muslim, III, p. 297. M. takes over from
Yal).,ya communlcatIon Whll:h. he had from Malik by reading aloud (by the
pupIls). the same one that Mahk had wntten in al-Muwatta' IV p 00
a Malik b. A. in al-Tirmidbl, I, p. 326. 7. cf. II, p. 261, 3.' ,. .
4. Al-ZurqanI, p. 242, bottom.
.:I' the philological field AbO. Nuwas praises Khalaf al-Ahmar in hi dir
ODshlm: wa.la isnaduhu 'ani'Z'$u[l,uj. Ahlwardt, Chalai, p. 4
16
ge
As e.g. Waki b. al·Jarral:t (d. 1-29). TahdMb, p. 215. II; IsJ;1aq b. Rahwa hi
(d. 238), Tab.l;Iujf., VIII, no. 19. y
""'MUEL ZWEMER INSTITUTE
BOX 3-.'i5
j .... -: - f"': Nf:, r:..J::.. enrm
[19B]
VOLUME TWO: CHAPTER 7
kind of religious sport. The interest in direct contact through talab
al-l;adith described in a previous chapter was one side of this fact.
Another side is shown by sentences, epigrams and accounts from all
centuries in which, in spite of an opposite development in literature
and study, great store is still set by the 'preserving of knowledge in
the heart' as opposed to 'preserving it on paper'.
In this respect two groups of judgements are in contrast. In des-
cribing them we will go back to the earlier epochs in this quarrel.
Both parties have had their opinions expressed by the Prophet
himself in traditions. One side makes the Prophet say: Iii taktubU
'anni shay'an siwa'l-Qur'iini wa-man kataba shay'an fa1yaml;uhu,
i.e. 'Do not write anything of me with the exception of the Koran,
but if anybody has written anything, he is to erase it: Of the other
side Ibn Jurayj transmits this report of 'Abd Allah b. 'Vmar. He
asked the Prophet: 'Am I to fetter knowledge?' (uqayyid al-'ilm).'
The Prophet assented and when asked what that meant he replied
that he understood by this written fixation. I;Iammad b. Salama also
tells us that the grandfather of 'Amr b. Shu'ayb had asked the
Prophet whether he might write down all he heard from him. The
Prophet said: 'Yes' 'Irrespective of whether you say something in
anger or in good humour?' The Prophet answered "Yes" also to
this, adding that in no state did he say anything but the truth."
AbU Hurayra says that an sat with the Prophet and listened
to his communications, but was unable to remember anything. When
he complained about this to the Prophet, he said: 'Take your right
hand as aid, making the movement of writing:' By inventing such
traditions,4 both contending parties endeavoured to produce
arguments' in favour of their views without either of them revealing
the motives for their theses. The opponents of writing expressed the
fear lest sayings of the Prophet included in books might not command
the respect due to such sacred contents and thought therefore that
it would be preferable to abstain from compiling such books. It was
also pointed out that Islam might run into the same danger as
earlier religions, whose adherents neglected the word of their
1 For the expression Qayyada al· 'ilm ct. Fragm. Hist. Arab., p. 297. 12. This
saying of the Prophet is also mentioned in the small collection in al-Mas'OdI,
IV, p. 169. 2, d. the proverb: qayyidu al·'ilm bi'l·kitiiba; this is quoted as
muwallad by al·Maydani, II, p. 63. nIt., in the same wording as a 1;ladith in aiM
SuyO.ti, Muzhir, II, p. 158, 8.
2 Ibn Qutayba. MukhtaZif al-I;IadUk, p. 344·
3 The Shi'ites cite a saying of I;Iasan b. 'Ali which recommends preservation
in writing. al.Ya'qfl.bi, II, p. 269, 10. This is connected with the phenomenon
discussed above, p. 23·
'" AI-Tirmidhi, II, p. II!.
AbO DawOd, II, p. 81, who himself used many writtelll10tes as sources for
his collection, does not quote in his Sunan traditions condemning writing down.
-
THE WRITING DOWN OF THE Ij:ADITH 185
God and turned to the books of their scholars; the I.tadith might in
the same way be preferred to the Koran in later time.
'
But the [199]
of the two opinions each other also in other ways--
m mdependent sentences, epIgrams, etc. On 011.e side there are
generally known and recogniZed sentences, such as, e.g.: kullu
'ilmin laysafi'l-qartiisi tjii'a,' 'Knowledge that is not on paper gets
lost/ or: mrJ q,uji;a marra, wa-ma kutiba qarra, lThings preserved in
memory are transient, written matter is enduring'; and didactic
poems which serve the same idea.' Sentences favouring writing
belong to the most respected al-I;Iadith. The traditionlst al-
is credited with the saying: ni'ma'Hnul;addithu aJ..daftar,
l.e. 'the best spreader of tradition is the written textbook:' The
Imam AJ.unad b. I;Ianbal is said to have said 'Spread traditions
only from written texts'-'The book transmits most reliably'
(al-kitabu al;fa:;u shay'in).· In these circles there was a preference for
telling which were intended to show how much the fidelity
of texts IS endangered, how they are exposed to additions and
changes, when entrusted merely to memory and oral transmission.
I'.' a rather comparis?n they speak of a pearl swallowed by a
pIgeon and gIven back agam sometimes enlarged and sometimes
diminished. One transmitter gives back the pearl of the I.tadith
absorbed by him with his own accretions, another in diminished
form, only a few render them, like Qatada, without any alteration
at all.'
Sentences defending the writing down of hadiths have their [200]
counterpart in others recommending an exclusively oral tradition
and condemning writing down. Al-Sha'bi, just mentioned, appears
to have been considered the foremost champion of those in favour
of writing I.tadith down, for a'sentence of the opposing party is
attached to his name. Al-Sha'bi hears a I.tadith from the caliph
1 These arguments are to be found in al·Darimi, pp. 64-7. in a special chap-
lam yara kitabat al-ZtadUh; then follows a chapter on the opposing
OptnlOn: man kitiibat al-'ilm. Amongst the arguments reference is
also made to Sl1ra 20:54 (ilmuha 'inda rabbf fl Rita-bin). A large collection of
traditional proofs from the origin and pr.ogress etc.: (jASB., XXV, pp.
303-329). The above-mentioned passages, WhlCh are quoted in his collections
after al.Khatib ai-Baghdadi, are here taken from older sources, as is seen from
the references. Al.Khai;ib aI-Baghdadi also wrote. apart from the chapters
about this subject in the work used here, a monograph on the subject: K.
Taqy'd al'lIm. Ahlwardt. Berl. Cat,. II, p. 4. DO. '035. [Ed. Y. aI.'Ishsh.
Damascus, 1949; it contains a rich collection of data. on the subject; cf. also
the parallel passages indicated in the editor's notes.]
2 Fleischer, Leip. Cat., p. 364a.
J E.g. what is reproduced by Sprenger, ZDMG, X, p. 6, 4.
'" AI·Tha'alibI, Syntagma, ed. Valeton, p. 10, ult.
G TahdMb, p. 143.
8 Ibid., p. 510.
[201]
186 VOLUME TWO: CHAPTER 7
'Abd al-Malik and asks for permission to write it down; but the
caliph says: 'We are a community who do not allow anybody to
write things down' (nai>nu ma'sharun Iii nuktibu ai>adan shay'an).l
At about the middle of the third centnry a contemporary of aI-
Bukhari and Muslim, Abii 'Ali al-Ba'in-2 prefers men who:
with application and zeal consider their ear as the inkwell
and their heart as the books in which to write
whereas students of knowledge learn only what is in books
In the fourth century Abu Sa'd 'Abd al-Ral,unan ibn Dost
3
says:
You must preserve in your heart and not collect in books,
Because these are liable to dangers which destroy them;
Water drowns them, fire bmTIs them,
Mice eat themand thieves steal them.
As late as the sixth century the well-known historian of Damascus,
Abii-'I-Qasim ibn 'Asakir (d. 571),4 recommends the oral handing on
oftraditions;
My friend, strive zealously to obtain (traditions) and receive
them from the men yourself (at first hand) without intermission,
Do not gather them from written documents, so that they may not
suffer from the disease of textual corruption. &
In the same way the history of Muslim scholars of all times
examples of Mh of traditions who to US appear almost fabulous m
their knowledge. The Qagi of Mosul, Abii Bakr Mu1).ammad b.
'Umar al-Tamimi (d. 355), is said to have known by heart the texts
of no less than 200,000 traditions. & Great importance was attached
to scrupulous fidelity in the preservation of texts and to the careful
observance of even the minutest points, such as, for example, that
the conjunctions wa andfa should be distioguished from one another
and the one should not be handed on when the other had been
heard.' But in the early days such small points of textual .trans-
mission were neglected. Such minutiae developed as skills m the
1 Yaqilt al·Musta Asrar al-J:[ukama: (Istanbul, 1300), p. 91.
I Al.Ma'sildi, VII, p. 329.
S Yatfmat al-Dahr, IV, p. 306=al-Kutubl. Fawat al-Wa/aym, I, p. 263.
4. Ibn Khallikan, no. 452, V, p, 29_
• 1 do not count here utterances like Tab. l;luff., XV, no. z (a teacher of
tradition angrily beats those who write after him); this is to be a sign of
humiIitv: 'Who am I that the /.taft: should write after me?
8 Ibid.. XII, no. 32.
1 Ibid. IX, no. 80.
THE WRITING DOWN OF THE <IADITH:r87
course of the progress of the science of tradition and were foreigu
to the teachers of the old days when teachers had more regard for
the contents than for the dead word. Defenders of the freer form of
transmission could quote Sufyan al-Thawri, who is believed to have
said: 'When I say that I transmit as I have heard, do not take this
literally: I merely refer to the sense.' The growing mass of traditions
soon made it impossible to make literal fidelity of transmission
obligatory.
In the fourth century it is stated that most of the i>uffii; allowed a
certain amount of latitude in respect of textual accuracy and were
content to reproduce the substance. The question whether a 1).aclith
transmitted accurately in substance but not in wording may claim
to be a correct 1).adith (al-riwiiya bi'l-ma'nit)-a question which was
raised as early as the third century'-becomes increasiogly a real
problem for the sclence of tradition. Whereas in the third (Muslim)
century the validity of transmission of the substance was still
sometimes limited" and williogly extended only to cases which were
shortly afterwards declared unobjectionable in the fourth century.
Abu'I-Layth al-Samarqancli (d. 383) still considers this question
controversial, but decides eventually in favour of the liberal opinion,
appea1iog to the activities of the, earliest period.
3
The liberal point of
view appears to have in fact prevailed.
4
Philologists therefore are
reluctant to accept transmitted 1).adith texts as philological evidence
because their wording was subject to the individual influences of
the transmitters. Only Ibn Malik does not share these doubts.'
People like Ibn Bakir al-Baghdadi (d. 388) or Abii'I-Khayr aI- [202]
I'ifahani (d. 568), who were famed for being able to recite not only
the texts (mutiin) but also the isniids& accurately by heart, become
rare. In the tenth century al-Maqqari (d. r041) names Abii 'Umar
ibn 'At from Xativa as the last to possess this ability.
'
The more was the need felt to represent the writing down of
1).acliths as a pious act and to fix religious norms for it. Of these
norms, among which detailed instructions about the insertion of
diacritical marks and other alds to reading occupied an important
position, we will only mention some which characterize the trend of
'Muslim religious thought. If a word like'Abd Allah b. X occurs, the
word 'Abd ought to be written on the same line as the succeeding
1 Cf. a1-Tirmidhl, II, p. 335.
II Muslim, introduction, p. 23.
S Bustan al· 'Arif£n (marginal edition, Cairo, 1303). p. 12.
"The various opinions are collected in aI-Khatib fols. 48bff.
led. Hyderabad, pp. 167f1.].
r. Khizanat al-Adab. I. pp. 5-8.
II Tab. Quff., XIII, no. 19, XVI, no. 14.
'I Al-Maqqarl, I, p. 874, 10, from below; d. his contemporary '!zz aI.DIn aI.
Muqaddasl (d. 613), Tab. l;lujj.. XVIII, no. 6.
188 VOLUME TWO: CHAPTER 7
word Allah, so that the one line does not end with' Abd and the next
begin with the blasphemous group 'Allah b. X'. Likewise the group
rasUl Allah $allii Alliihu 'alayhi has to be written on one line so that a
line should not begin with Alliih $.1. 'a.m.
'
But one often finds that
these pious rules were infringed in manuscript and in print.
CHAPTER EIGHT
THE ijADITH LITERATURE
[203]
1 Taqrib, fols. 53Ef. [naw 25, transl.]A, XVII (Igor). no. 528.]
"•
•
j
,
I
DESPITE the prominent position which motives of religious life
occupy in the Islamic community, it is not religious elements which
determine the course of literature during the first phase of the
development of the Muslim empire. Apart from the Koran, at the
beginning of the literary history 01 Islamwe find not a religious but a
secular literature. Only in the second century are the beginnings of
canonic literature to be seen, and during that period former seeds of
its later development, latent in the formerly suppressed Ieligious
society, attained a certain predominance.
The causes of this phenomenon are to be found in the different
directions of intellectual trends in the Umayyad period on the one
hand and the 'Abbasid period on the other. The same phenomena
which determine the tenor of higher social and political life also
illuminate the change in literary pursuits. The Umayyad rule,
because of its worldly spirit, was better able to influence the pro-
motion of profane literature. It is not unlikely that the collection
of pagan poetry began under the influence of Umayyad princes.
l
It was chiefly historical knowledge which was encouraged and
furthered during the first period of literature in Islam, and it is only
necessary to remember what Muslim historians of literature tell of
the activities of 'Abid b. Shariya. The writings of this man from [2041
South Arabia are much concerned with biblical legends and stories,
2
but these for Muslims fall into the category of ta'y,kh or awii'il and
not into that of religious, specifically Islamic literature. Only the
1 ~ m a d b. Abi Tahir (d. 280) in Rosen, Zapiski of the Archaeological
Society, St Petersburg, III, p. 268, 13; d. Fihrist, p. 91, 20; also in the coHee·
tieD of material which Wellhausen has made in respect of the beginnings of
noting down ancient Arabic poetry, Reste arab. Heidenthums. p. 201, Dote 2,
there are some data.
2; See part I, pp. 94 and 169 to the passages referred to: Ibn Qutayba,
Mukhtalij al·l;ladith, p. 340, cites from the work of the genealogist from South
Arabia (in the Ms. vocalized 'Ubayd) a communication about the age of
Luqma.n with the explicit remark that such stories lack an isniid. Ab'O. J:Ia.n.
Din., p. IO, I, quotes a communication about the relation of Nimrod to
Ya'rub b. Qal;rtan, Agh., XXI, p. 191, 4ff., the explanation of historical
occasion for an ancient Arabic proverb.
190 VOLUME TWO: CHAPTER 8
collection of data concerning the life of the Prophet is a link between
this literature and true religious interests. The nature of this rising
literature of the first century can be deduced from the contrast
which is drawn between it and the literary trends of the following
epoch. This contrast is illuminated by the historical note that
MuJ:>ammad b. IsJ:>aq (d. ISO) had the merit of diverting the princes
from occupying themselves with books that were of no use and
turning their attention to the conquests of the Prophet, his mission
and the beginning of creation.' In as far as this note is based upon
knowledge of actual literary circumstances we may presume a
predominance of secular literature before the commencement of
literature permeated with religious points of view."
It seems that gnomic literature, which was much in accordance
with ancient Arab sentiment, was also cultivated. Wise sayings were
noted down in report that these were given the
special name of majalla
3
-which seem to have been individual
collections only and not meant for the general public. Several pieces
of information give us some idea of these written notes about the
l;ikma. Ma'qil b. Khuwaylid, a Hudhaylite poet of pagan times,
quotes three wise sayings at the end of a and introduces them
with the words: 'As he says who dictates the writing on parchment,
while the scribe writes' (... kamii qiila mumli'Z-kitlibi fi'l-raqqi idh
[205) kha!!ahu'l-kiitibu).' This is an important proof for the fact that
wise sayings were noted down even in the most ancient days.
'Imram b. J:Ia.in once recounted the following saying from the
Prophet: 'Modesty only brings good' (al-l;ayli' Iii ya'ti ilili bi-
khayrin). Upon which, Bashir b. Ka'b said: 'It is written in the
l;ikma, 'modesty is connected with seriousness, modesty is connected
with dignity' ("nna mina'l-l;ayii'i waqiiran, inna mina'l-l;ayii'i
sakinatan). 'Imran replied: 'I make a communication in the name of
the Prophet and you tell me what is in your
5
Mu'awiya I
hears a witty reply of 'Adi b. J:Iatim and says to his courtier J:Iabib
b. Maslama al-Fihri (d. 42); 'Write this in your book, since it is
l;ikma:
6
Wise sayings occurring in old poems are counted as l;ikma;'
1 AbO. Al:].mad b.• Adi in Wustenfeld's introduction to Ibn Hisham, p. viii.
2 Cf. Sprenger's article on Kremer'sWaqidiedition,JASB,1856, p. 213.
3 Khizanat al·Adab, II, p. II, top (in respect of the variant to Nab., 1:24)·
This is the basis for the title of the collection of proverbs by Abo.. 'Ubayd
(who himself cites from Kutub al-Ijikma, al.Maydani, T, p. 329, penult.):
al.Majalla, ci. Frankel, Amm. Frema., p. 247. note. [Read 'AbO. <Ubayda',
d. R. Sellheim, Die Classisck·arabischen Sprichworter-Sammlungen, pp. 69-70.]
4. Hudhayl., 56: 15££.
r; B. Adab, no. 76.
• AI· 'lgd, III, p. '44 top: cl.•1.M.s'fidi, V, p. r8, penult.
'1 Agh., XI, p. 135, 5. '1 says of a verse by Suwayd b. Abi Ka.hil. that
the Arabs: ta'udduhii min 'bikamiha, ibid., p. 171, 18; c.!., ibid, p. 44. 12, a
verse by Afwah: min biktnGt aIM'Arab wa-adiibika.
THE I;iADITH LITERATURE
hence also the saying attributed to the Prophet: inna mina'l-shi'ri
l;ikmatan, 'l;ikma is to be found in poetry." Perhaps we may
combine with these accounts the Kitiib Bani Tamim (referred to on
another occasion)" from which a wise saying is quoted, if this kitlib
does not describes in general the diwiin of poets of the tribe of Tarnim.
The Tamimites are known for their wisdom, and amongst them
aI-AJ:>naf b. Qays is famous in l;ikma and l;itm; in his name a number
of wise sentences are quoted.
3
Aktham b. $ayfi also belongs to this
tribe; he was one of the foremost l;ukamii' at-'Arab, who 'uttered
many wise sayings" which free-thinkers circulated in competition
with the Koran as late as the third century> in the same way as,
according to Muslim historians, the contemporaries of Muhammed [206]
attempted to contrast ancient Arab wisdom with the Koran as at
least its equal.
6
As last offshoot of this gnomic literature may be
considered a 'Collection of sayings by the caliph aI-Man.iir',
which mentions, with the remark that this collection
was currently in the hands of copyists and was well known by
them.
'
Fables about the conquests of Islam were written down already
under the Umayyads, in connection with data from the biography
of the Prophet, and read with predilection at court. According to a
report from aI-Zuhri, the caliph 'Abd aI-Malik saw such a maghiizi
book in the hands of one of his sons and had it burnt, recommending
his son to read the Koran and pay heed to the sunna.
6
Though the
text of this account unmistakably bears the stamp of circles
who condemned unauthenticated maghiizi in favour of authentically
1 Al.Mas'l1:di, IV, p. 169, penult., Agh., XXI, p. 49, 17, where instead
of laft.ukman laltikaman is presumably to be read. Ct. also Agh., XI,
p. 80, 19.
:: ZDMG, XXXII, p. 355, compare the wise saying quoted there (which Sayf
al.Dawla adopted, Yatimat ai·Dahr, II p. 30, 9) from ancient times, Zuhayr
8:2: wa·skarru maniltatin 'asbun mu'aru, in al.Damiri (s.v. aI-tays), I, p. 208,
8, quoted from an anonymous poet with the variant: taysun mu'iiru. Sbaddad
al·'Absl boasts of his horse: Iii tarudu wa.la tu'aro, Agk., XVI, p. 32, 6, from
below, cf. Ifam., p. 101, V. 4.
a II, pp. 261-8, d. al·Maydani, II, p. 227, to the proverb min 'busn
etc.
.. Ibn Durayd, p. I27. I7: lahu kaIiim katMrft'i-ltikma.
r; Ibn aI-]awzi in the additions to Ibn Khallikan, ed. Wiistenfeld, p. 5. AbQ'l.
MaJ;>asin, II, p. ,84, 10 [cl. H. Ritter, Is1., XIX ('930), p. 4: P. Kraus, RSO,
XIV (1934). p. II9,] Ibn al·Riwandi son of a Jew converted to Islam who
among others wrote a book with the title Shatterer oftke Koran (see Excursuses
and Annotations) .
• T.b., I, p. '208, al·Ya'qfibl, ll, p. 37 (c!. Sprenger, I, p. 94), Suwayd b.
and the MajalIat Lf'qman; this last is explained by Ibn Hisb.8.m. p.
285,3 with Q,.ikmat Luqman.
, Bayan,lo1. '56b[IlI, p. 367].
a Ansab al·Ashraj, p. 172.
G
I Abft'l.Ma{18.sin. I, p. 508, 7.
II AI.DamIrt I, p. I76 (s.v. al·bagkl) from Ta'1'ikb Baghdad. [The anecdote is
not in AbO. JJanifa's biography in the Ta'rikh Baghdad, and is probably not
quoted from that work at al1.]
literature of which we have just 'given some examples. On the other
hand the theological views of the 'Abbasid period also show in some
anecdotes about these times. We will quote but one: Abu Yusuf,
pupil of AbU I;Ianifa, was greatly interested in magltazi, lafsir and
ayyiim al-'Arab,l so much so that he missed some of his master's
lectures. One day after he had been absent for several days his
teacher asked him: 'Nowtell me, who was Goliath's standard-bearer?'
Abu Yiisu! was ready with his answer. 'You are hniim: he said,
'and if you do not stop teasing me, I shall ask you in front of all
the people which battle was fought earlier, that of Badr or that of
, mud? You will be unable to answer; yet this is the most elementary
question in history:' This story shows with what superior airs theo-
logians looked down upon historical questions, having by now
completely entangled themselves in their casuistic system.
The day of the theologians had arrived. In the shadow of rulers
clad in the Prophet's cloak-we cannot consider here the literature
of translations which were produced chiefly by non-Muslims--the
subtleties of theological jurisprudence prospered and secular
literature also found it easiest to assert itself in a form which
adapted itself to· the demands of theological taste. This explains
many peculiarities in the historical literature of those days, from
which ouly a few original thinkers were able to break free.
This also was the time when the religious !]adith became a branch
of literature, and as such it is tile typical product of the religious
spirit of that epoch. It is however WTong to think (as is sometimes
done) that the collection of !]adith is the point of departure of legal
literature and that codified law books and compendia only developed
from a profound study and practical application of these sources.
The facts of literary history reveal that this literature developed
in just the opposite way. Legal literature proper, which represents
the result of comprehensive thinking, is chronologically prior to the
literature of the !]adith. The works of Abu I;Ianifa and his compan-
ions and disciples, Abu Yusuf and Mu!]ammad al-Shaybani, the
works of al-Shaft'i, the many early works on single chapters of law
whose titles are listed in great number in the relevant section of the
Fihrist, long precede !]adith literature proper; they are the realfiqh
books. These books clearly show that they were not WTitten at a
time when certain results could be deduced from fixed principles;
they continually reveal the gropings and unsteady gait of beginners,
and frequently show clifferences of opinion within the same schooL
The authors could not yet draw on the material of collected tradi-
[207]
19
2
VOLUME TWO: CHAPTER 8
recommended traditions,' there nevertheless seems nothing against
admitting the existence of such literature in early times. But even
amongst people who were governed by the demands of religious life,
results were produced which the next generation could not accept
as valid manifestations of the religious spirit. If we consider how
many objections 'Abbasid theologians have against the old
we may get an idea of the arbitrariness and of the trend
counter to the theological spirit which must have predominated m
the exegesis of the Koran. Otherwise it would be utte:ly inco:n-
prehensible that the tafsir is put on the same plane as things whIch
are completely foreign to the religious trends.
The same arbitrariness also predominated in the maghazi of
earlier times, which were presumably only aimed against the
cultivation of popular legends about the conquests. These legends
are contrasted with historical reports allegedly based on more
correct traditions, which were meant to push the former n;to the
background with the rise of the religious trend
Already in the first century, 'Amir b. Shura.!;lil al-Sha bl (died m the
first decade of the second century) occupied himself ,,1th !]adiths
of the maghazi and Malik b. Anas points to the maghazi of the
Medinian Mus§. b. 'Uqba
3
(d. 141) as being the most correct magltazi.
4
Only with the development of the science of traditions, which a!so
included this chapter in its sphere, was a critical method applIed
similar to that used in respect of tradition in general. Before that
they developed in a popular way independently of the of
theologians, who showed but little confidence m them. As religIOUS
science gained ground under the 'Abbasids, theologians turned away
from the knowledge contained in that literature as being useless
profane entertainment.. .
This attitude is partly shown m accounts concernmg the old
1 A saying is ascribed to Imam Al;Lmad: three things have no foundation
tafsir (which is arbitrary, not based on tradition), the malii.(l-im and the magha.zJ.
aI-Suyfit
i
, Itqan, II. p. 310. By tafsir (of which people arc warned) was meant
in old days arbitrary interpretation. Al·Darimi. p. 61: 'one should beware of
the ta/sir of the Prophet's l].adith much as one should beware of the ta/sir of the
Koran.' By this people had presumably in mind ta/sIr of the. type of the Ko:a
n
-
ic explanations of Muqatil b. Sulayman (d. 150) whose
were condemned, Tahdhfb, p. 574; Itqiin, II, p. 224 [ef. Goldziher,
p. 55, and for a criticism of his conclusions H. Birkeland, Old Mushm Oppon-
tion against I1tterpretation of the Koran, Oslo, 1955]·
2 Sec preceding note.
:l These are mentioned in a chronological report which runs counter to Ibn
Is1;Laq in B. Magklizf" no. 34. Note that the of Musa. b. were still
in literary circulatIOn at the end of the mnth century. Asanid al·Mubad-
ditbin, I, foI. 142a; d. also AhIwardt, Ber!. Cat. II, p. 248, no. 1554 red. E.
Sachau, in Sitzungsber. of the Berlin Academy, 1904].
"Tab. ljuff., III, no. II; IV, no. 43.
THE I:;IADITH LITERATURE
193
[208]
ditions conveniently to hand, as could the students of the flqh in
the third and fourth centuries, but had to rely, in so far as they
used traditions, on single traditions, self collected and learned in
each individual case, either from oral sources or from existing

I Syrie moae1'nl: (in L'Univsrs). Paris, 1848, p, I04b.
i An odd notion of a quite exceptional kind was put forward as late as 1881
by Nathanael Pischon in his book Dey Einfluss des Islam auf das httusIi(;he,
sociale, politische Leben seiner Bekenner, p. 2. He speaks of the 'sunna, Le.
tradition' etc. and of the kaggudah, Le. the interpretation of it by distinguished
Muslim scholars. Perhaps this is a confusion with the Jewish Haggada.?
:II As e.g. in the anecdotes mentioned by Sprenger, Mobammad, p. lxxxii,
note.
II
For a long time many odd concepts were current regarding the
beginning of 1).adith collections. Many of these unfounded specu-
lations of earlier times about the origin of the 1).adith compilations
have been deservedly forgotten and have been replaced by better
knowledge which gained ground also among a wider public. But one
of these oddities might usefully be mentioned, if for no other
reason than to demonstrate the progress which has been achieved by
scholarship during the last few decades. In I848 a French Orientalist
described the process of the development of traditions as ending
with the caliph Mu'awiya 1. Jules David, historian of Muslim Syria,
explained the state of affairs-we do not know on what authority-
in such a way that he has the founder of the Umayyad dynasty
deciding to put an end to the growth of the sunna, which had so
greatly increased that the parchment, upon which the traditions
had been written down, weighed two hundred camel loads. For this
purpose the ruler called to Damascus two hundred theologians from
all parts of the Islamic world. Fromthese he chose the six wisest and
most intelligent and instructed them 'to reduce to proportion the
great mass of dreams of two generations. These scholars cons-
cientiously set to work and reduced the vast library which they had
to condense into but six books.' At the end, all the lumber ((alTas)
which was left over was thrown into the river Barad'i,l
So naive a conception of how and when the 1).adith was collected
tallies well with the view, which was previously current and which
even today is often repeated, that the sunna is by etymology and by
its nature a counterpart or even an imitation of the Jewish Mishnah.'
This fable was by no means derived from a Muslim source, though
Islamic writers do not exclude the possibility that the founder of
the Umayyad dynasty, who had little belief in the sunna, paid
special attention to the 1).adiths.· There is however no trace of that
[210)
[211]
I95
for the old
THE IjADITH LITERATURE
council at Damascus, or of the auto-da-fe prepared
lumber which could not yet exist.
The .earliest datum Muslim authors provide in respect of the
collectIOn of t?e 1)..adith IS by Mu1).ammad b. al-I,Iasan al-Shaybani
(d.. I89), who IS saId to have learnt from Malik b. Anas that 'Umar
II Instructed Abii Bakr b. 'Umar b. I,Iazm: 'Seek out what is extant
of the 1).adith of the Prophet or his sunna, or the hadith of 'Umar
and others, and write them down, because I fear decay of know-
ledge and the disappearance of the 'Ulamii' (duras al-'ilm wa-
dhahiib This report is often quoted' and frequently
serv:
es
a pomt of dep.arture for the Islamic literary history of the
and modem lIterary history also sometimes attributes a
his;oncal character to it.
4
It is true that we hear enough of the zeal
of Umar II for through which he hoped to initiate a
new era after the IrreliglOusness of his predecessors. About his zeal
to have written down and collected we have also another
ac,:ount, sa)TIug that 'Umar II had individual groups of traditions
wn!ten dam;, as for:x.ample preserved by 'Amra bint 'Ubayd
Allah b. Ka b .b: Malik (d. I06).6 The caliph is also said to have
ordered Shlha? al-ZuJ;ri to write down traditions, and according
t? al-SUyutl (quotmg earlier authors in his K. al-Awii'il) this collec-
tIon was the first attempt in this direction (awwal man dawwana'l-
1;adith al-Zuhri).' Thus we see how admiring posterity endeavoured
connect the pious .caliph with the literature of Islamic tradition,
Just as made ?is zeal for obtaining individual sayings of the
Prophet m authentic form equal to that of pious theologians. 7
. Nevertheless, b:cause of the many contradictions which appear
m the accounts from different sides, we are unable to
accept_ a:, the pomt o! of literature the report of al-
ShaybanI that the begmnmg of systematic collection was initiated
1 AI-Shaybani's Muwatta', p. 389, Btib iktittib al·'ilm, d. Sprenger. lASB.
1856 p. 322, no. 69.
• 2 E.g. Al.Darimi, p. ?8, there is another version according to which
Umar expressed thIS deSIre to AhI al.Madina. B. also quotes this, but I
cannot gIVe the reference. [Al.Ta'Yikk al·Saghir, p. 105; cf. also Ibn Sa'd,
p. '34• p. 353; aI-Khatib, Taqy'd, pp. 105-6.]
AI·Zurqam, I. p. la, al·Qastallani, I, p. 7, here passages from historical
works are collected.
'" E.g. Muir, Mahomet, I, p. xxxii,
• ZDMG. XII, p. 245.
II See the qu?tations in 'Abd introduction to Muw. Shaybani, p.
13· I_do not that the small collection of 200-300 I;1adiths ascribed to al.
Zuhn ([aI-KhatIb, Ta'rfkk, XIV, p. 87.] Abft.'l-Mahasin I p 309 2) is
connected with this. I .} •• }
'1 II, p. 72, reports that the caliph made Abn Salam al.I;IabashI
n:
avel
to his c<:urt from afar by means of the barid in order to hear from him
directly (mushdfahatan) a 1).adIth of which he was bearer.
VOLUME TWO: CHAPTER 8
I94
[209)
I9
6
VOLUME TWO: CHAPTER 8
by 'Umar II. The work done by Abu Bakr al-I;lazmi is nowhere
mentioned in the literature and it would have been impossible to
avoid using it if such work had really existed. Muslim theologians
evade this difficulty by the unwarranted assumption that 'Umar II
died before he had received the work completed by Abu Bakr ibn
I;lazm,' and the collection was therefore not promulgated and thus
never got into religious circulation. Malik, or rather his authority
yal;tya b. Sa'id (d. I43), was well able to supply authentic informa-
tion about the activities of 'Umar II who lived only half a century
before them, but the report of Malik is suspect because it occurs in
no other version of the Muwaj!a' except that of al-Shaybani. From
there it was eagerly taken up as an isolated account by scholars of
later times who were searching for a point of beginning for l;tadith
literature. In itself it is nothing but an expression of the good
opinion that people had of the pious caliph and his love for the
sunna.
There are more positive data in Islamic literary history for the
beginning of tradition literature. These data, as we shall see, even
anticipate a stop which was taken only later in this literature for
characterization of its development in the second century. It ,s
said that Ahmad ibn Hanbal named 'Abd aI-Malik b. Jurayj
(d. ISO), in I;Iijaz, and Sa;id b. Abi 'Aruba (d. I56), in 'Iraq, as
first who arranged the existing material by chapters." From this
historians of literature concluded-this datum is met with in nearly
all later books of this kind-that these Muslim theologians represent
the commencement of hadith collection. This interpretation of Al;t-
mad ibn Hanbal's however, rests upon a misunderstanding.
The of these theologians are not extant and, in judging their
[2121 trend and tendency, recourse cannot be had to texts. But from some
indications it seems likely that the works of these two scholars of
the second century had nothing to do with the collecting of l;tadiths.
As to Ibn Abi 'Aruba' we may mention that it is reported of him
that 'he made not notes (kitiib) 'but remembered by heart all the
1 AI-Zurqani, I, p. 10, below, of Ibn 'Abd al-Razzaq 'an Ibn Wahb in the
name of Malik.
:/: AI-Nawawi, Tahdhib, p. 787 (awwal man $annafa al.ktdub), Tab. l;Iuff· v,
no. 9: cf. Kremer, tJber die Siidarab. Sage (Leipzig, 1866], p. 15, Freytag,
Einleitung in das 5twZium det' arab. Spracke, p. 397' . .
3 This Sa'id was not accepted as a fully valld authonty by pIOUS people;
he is said to have confessed to qaaar. A remark relating to this by Suiyan
b. 'Uyayna can be found in al.Khatib aI-Baghdadi, fo1. 35b [ed. Hyderabad,
pp. I23-4]. That Sa'id had rationalistic tendencies can be seen from the fact
that he pretended to be the bearer of the following completely Murji'ite
hadith: If someone's soul leaves the body being free of three things he will
paradise. These three things are arrogance (al·kibar, a nonsensical
variant al.kanz), faithlessness with the public treasury (al.ghuliU) and debts
(dayn), al-Tirmidhi.l, p. 208.
THE J;lADITH LITERATURE I97
traditions that he heard:
1
This report inspires well-founded doubts
about the correctness of the conclusion concerning literary history
derived from Ibn Hanbal's communication. Inasmuch as it was
possible in those to speak of systematic collections, these
referred to jiqh books rather than traditions, first attempts at
codices arranged in chapters of law, and also using relevant material
from the traditional sunna material.
2
Such juridical attempts, which
were not confined to that period, were called sunan, and in defining
them it is expressly stated that they were arranged byjiqh subjects,'
while some are expressly called kitiib al-sunan ji'l-jiqh.· The accurate
summary of their contents in Ibn Abi'l-Nadim
5
shows that the
works of Ibn J urayj and Ibn Abi •ArUba belong to this group.
These books therefore are presumably those which caused Al;tmad
ibn I;lanbal to ascribe the pioneering work to these two scholars.
Ibn Abi'l-Nadim lists however even older sunna works of this
type, e.g.-to quote but one-a kitiib al-sunan ji'l-jiqh by Makl;till
(d. n6).·
Such works corresponded to the needs of a time when in public [213)
life and government people began to attach importance to conform-
ity with the sunna in the administration of justice of state affairs,
and when caliphs consulted the opinion of theologians on religious
aspects of public law. What the time called for were not informative
l;tadith works but compendia which would serve practical needs.'
It would be useless speculation to puzzle one's brains about the
form, contents and spirit of works of which nothing, no line or
quotation, has been preserved. But one fundamental work is
extant, representing roughly the level reached by the development
of legal literature at that time: this is the Muwa!!a' of Malik b.
Anas.
1 Tab. J:Iuff., v, no. 19·
ZThe 'IraqI judge al.!;Iasan b. Ziyad al-Lu'lu'l (d. 204), who was a pupil
of the most eminent companions of Abl11:Ianifa, is said with some exaggeration
to have claimed that he had heard from Ibn Jurayj (as must be read) I2,000
1;ladiths of which the lawyers were in need, kulluhii yal).tiijt'- 'ilayha al-fuqahii'.
Ibn Qutlubugha, ed. FIUgel, p. 16, no. 55·
3 Fihrist, p. 225. 2I: kitiib al-sunan wa-yabtawE 'ala kutub al-jiqh; 226, 16, 20;
25: 227, 21. !
(, Ibid., pp. 227 ult. (al-Awza.'i); 228, 3. 5. 9, and later, from a period (third
century), pp. 228, 17. 20; 229, I4, 17; 230, 5, 20 (al Bukhari); 23I. IS. I9, 23 etc.
& Ibid.. pp. 226. 6; 227, 9.
• Ibid., p. 2'27, 23.
7 [The distinction between sunan and musannaf is perhaps too sharply
drav."U. That .Al;\mad b. l;Ianbal quotes an early musannafby Wakl' b. ]arraJ;l
(d. 169) was pointed out by Goldziher himself. ZDMG. I, pp. 469-7°. More
recently parts of early collections have been recovered, cf. M. \Veisweiler,
Istanbuler Handschriftenstudien ZUY arabischen Traditionsliteratur (Istanbul,
1937)·1
1 E.g. al-MuwaUa', III, p. 15,26, bottom, and very frequently.
III
The Muwatla' cannot be regarded as the fust great collection of
traditions in Islam, nor does not appear to have been considered as
such in Muslim literature. Despite the great prestige which it has
enjoyed, from its appearance to this day, in the east and west of t.he
Islamic world-the history of its origin has been surrounded wIth
large number of pious legends-and despite the great reverence
shown to the name of the author, the great imam diir al-hijra, it did
not originally gain its authority as a canonical work of tradition. We
shall see that, with the exception of the Maghribi schools, t.his work
has no place amongst the 'six books' which we shall descnbe later,
and only the reverence of later generations, who ,,:,ere no 10fo'ger in
close touch with the origins and had the urge to WIden the CIrcle of
canonic literature, occasionally included in that category. .
The work of Malik is in fact not in the proper sense a collectIon
of traditions, forming a counterpart to the §aM/ts ofthenext century,
nor one which could, from the point of view of the literary historian,
be mentioned as a member of the same literary group. It is a corpus
juris, not a corpus traditionum. In saying this we do not think so
much of quantitative considerations, i.e. that the Muwa!!a' does not
yet extend to all the chapters which form the scheme of contents
in the collections of traditions, but rather of the purpose and plan
of the work. Its intention is not to sift and collect the 'healthy'
elements of traditions circulating in the Islamic world but to
illustrate the law, ritual and religious practice, by the ijmii' recog-
nized in Medinian Islam, by the sunna current in Medina, and to
create a theoretical corrective, from the point of view of ijmii'
and sunna, for things still in a state of flux. Inasmuch as the book
has anything in common with a of it lies .in
the sunna rather than the l;tadith. OccasIOnally Malik does not clte
one single tradition in a paragraph but ouly cites jatwiis by recog-
nized authorities in actual or casnistically pointed cases in order to
conclude with his own assenting opinion and by stating Medinian
usage and consensus.' A transmitter of the l;tadith school would have
put forward notjatwiis, but l;tadiths .gomg back.to the Prophet...
We have seen in a previous sectIon what dIfferences of OpInIOn
existed in the various provinces of the Islamic empire in regard to
even the most elementary questions of legal and religious usage. At
a time when life in accordance with the sunna, public administration
in conformity with the sunna. found recognition in public life, it
became of practical importance to find a 'smooth path', among the
windings of contrary trends to establish legal nonns authentically.
[214]
198
VOLUME TWO: CHAPTER 8
THE 1;!ADITH LITERATURE 199
The Medinian Miilik wanted to serve this interest with reference to
the practice of his I;lij iiz home and he achieved this intention in two
directions. First of all he collected the documents of the Medinian
sunna for the several chapters of legal and ritual life, and secondly,
he codified that which is lawful in individual cases, on the basis of
these sunna documents or, when these were lacking, on the grounds
of the consensus (ijmii') which had gained validity at his home up
to that time, i.e. the jus consuetudinis, the customary law, of Medina.
This ijmii' of Medina is one of the main pillars of his stipulations,
and he always stresses in establishing legal usages that theyrepresent
customs or opinions which are generally recognized by the scholars
in our town or about which there is with us ('indana) general
consensus (al-mujtama' 'alayhi).l It can of course, occur that this
Medinian ijtnii' is contrary to doctriue and praxis in other coun-
tries." It is, however, outside the scope of the Muwa!!a' to mention
and examine the traditions on which it is based. The traditional
material is here not the pwpose but the means and is considered only
in so far as it has to serve his practical purposes. Consideration of
the Medinian ijmii' was so much the predominating point of viewfor
Miilik that he does not even hesitate to give it preference when it
is in conflict to traditions incorporated as correct in his corpus."
Miilik b. Anas therefore is not a mere collector of traditions but
is fust and foremost an interpreter of them from the point of view of
praxis. This can be demonstrated by many examples from his work.
We will content ourselves with one which appears to us to be
particularly characteristic and which permits the reader clear
insight into the nature of the Muwa!!a'. In the second century, no
fixed legal practice had as yet developed in Islam regarding the
treatment of a Muslim who became unfaithful to Islam. It appears
to have been certain that the murlaaa (apostate) had to be punished
with death, but there was no unanimous opinion whether attempts
had first to be made at reconverSion (istitiiba), and in the event of its
success the capital punishment became void or whether the culprit
was to be condemned to death without previous istitiiba. In practice
the treatment of such apostates depended largely on the arbitrary
decision of the authorities and theory about this problem was also
uncertain.' This difierence in opinion is reflected in the divergent
teachings of the madhiihib al-fiqh which are collected in the ikhtiliij
works. Theorists have exercised their subtlety in this question too
by various distinctions. 'Atii, a theologian from Mecca (d. TIS),
, E.g. ibid., II, pp. 76. 365. 378; III, p. I6; IV p. 53. etc.
tI Al-Nawawi, IV, p. IIg.
*.AI-Muwat/a', III, pp. 95-6; cf. above p. 88 note 2.
4 The earliest differences of opinion are dealt with in a special chapter of the
K. al-Siyar al·KabIr by fols. 374ft. [IV, pp. I62ff.]
G'
[215J
1 Al-Sha'rani, Mfzan, II, p. 172; Rab-mat al-Umma, p. 138.
S The practice in modern times can be seen from Isabel Burton, The Inne"
Life o/Syria, etc., London, 1875. pp. 180-203.
is K. al.Khariij, pp. Iog:ff.
Malik from Zayd b. Aslam. The Prophet has said: 'He who
changes his religion, his neck you must cut off: The meaning of
these words by the Prophet is, as it appears to us ana Goa knows
best: He who leaves Islam and takes up another religion, as for
example that of the Zindlqs or the like, he will be killed if his
apostasy becomes evident. Zindlqism consists not of open con-
fession but of secret falling away from true belief under the cloak
of outward conformity. Suc1l people are not subjected to attempts
at conversion because (the sincerity of their) conversion cannot be
assured since they had already been secretly unfaithful while
openly confessing Islam; I do not think that conversion need be
attempted in suc1l cases as their word is not reliable. But in the
case of hinl who openly c1langes to another religion from Islam
an attempt must be made to re-convert him; if he returns to
Islam (it is well), but if not he will be killed. If it happens that
distinguishes between apostates who were born Muslims (these were
killed without previous attempts at reconversion) and converts to
Islam who subsequently apostatize (in such cases reconversion must
be attempted).' Later teachers of the law have, with almost no
exception, in their codicils claimed that istitaba is an obligatory
duty of the authority concerned.
But it took a long time before suc1l consensus was reached;"
and in the second century it was still very far off. Abu Yusuf writes
[216] in his politico-legal memorandum (see above, p. 7Z) to Hariin al-
Rashid characterizing the different views about attempts at re-
conversion previous to punishment by death: Everyone quotes
traditions for his opinion and finds proofs in them. Defenders of the
unconditional death penalty quote the saying of the Prophet: man
batldala ainahu fa-' qtuluhu, i.e. 'who changes his religion, him you
must kill: Defenders of the liberal view quote the saying: I am
ordered to fight the people until they confess that there is no god but
Allah; if they do so their property and blood is safe with me but
they must render their account to Allah:" Evidence against the
liberal view is explained away. The data quoted for and against
from the earlier history of the caliphate also proves the indecision
that prevailed on this question in theory and practice. Those inter-
ested in the history of this question can find the materials well set out
in the relevant chapter of Abu Yiisuf. We are only concerned with the
passage by Malik b. Anas on this problem, which shows the method
of this theologian:
:20I THE I;£ADITH LITERATURE
1 The opinion also developed that these had to be killed according to the
wording: He who changes his religion, c£., al-Nawa'Wi, Arba'in (Cairo. 1277.
Shahin), p. 30 to no. '4.
II Al-MuwaUa'. III, p. 197. In Shayb., p. 368, where the paragraph about
the apostates occurs, this part is missing and only the subsequent tradition
is told in the same words as inthe MuwaUa'.
3 Cf. SnouckHurgronje, in Lbl.fUr orient. Phil., 1884, p. 425.
4 See above, p. 83.
.l> Snouck Hurgronje I.e. For ta'arruq'cf. also IV, p. 38, 2. Zurq.,
III, p. 9.
6 E.g. $dhiriten, p. 20, note 1. AI;lmad b. I:Ianbal was asked: ''Whose
tions can be 'Written down and whose ra'y can be taken as a model?' The
answer was <The I;ladith of Malik and the ra'y of Malik: Takdhib, p. 534. 3,
Zurq., I, p. 4. In Ibn Bashkuwal-where, however. ,..a'y and I;ladith are put
into strict opposition in characterizing theological trends, e.g. ed. Codera p.
25. 4-Ya'y Malik occurs continuously. Cf. also Ibn Mu'in in Tab. IjIuff., no.
47; Takdkib. p. 374, 12: lam yakun badUk wa·kiina ra'y Malik.
suc1l a thing occurs I am of the opinion that they must be called
back to Islam and that attempts must be made to convert them;
if they are converted, this is accepted, but if they do not do SO
they will be killed. Also those are not meant (in the above saying
of the Prophet) who change from Judaism to Christianity or vice
versa' or confessors of any other religion who change tlleir
religion but only (if they leave) Islam. He is meant who changes
from Islam to another religion and confesses it openly. And it is
God who knows."
The words 'as it appears to us' which occur in this passage of the [217]
M uwa!!a' also lead us to another characteristic of Malik and his
work. It is generally thought that Malik was the opponent of the
'Iraqian so-called speculative scpool in which the justification of
opinio or, as they called it, ra'y, predominated. It is thought that
Malik had condemned its justification and that this was typical
of his J:Iijazi school in contrast to the 'Iraqi trend. Consideration of
Malik's basic work, however, would not bear this out.' Malik had had
sufficient contact with the ra'y school' to be convinced of the
inadequacy of historically given sources for all the demands of prac-
tical life-and this was what he had in mind. Therefore he felt
himself sufficiently authoritative to intervene and legislate inde-
pendently in cases where he found neither a Medinian tradition nor
Medinian ijmii'. He does, in other words, practise ra'y and to such
an extent that he was occasionally accused of tal arruq= (Iraqization. 5
Muslim theologians were aware of this and they constantly refer to
ra'y M aUk in the same way as they do to the ra'y of the 'Iraqis.'
There are, in effect, not infrequent passages in the Muwa!!a' where
the term ra' aytu, with which the propouents of ray were reproached,
is used: 'my ra'y, my own independent opinion is such and such';
VOLUME TWO: CHAPTER 8 zoo
least thirty isniid versions,! whereas Miilik was really content with
one. Therefore he quotes sayings which were not incorporated in
any of the later canonical collections.' Since Miilik was only con-
cerned with the requirements of legal life he also paid little attention
to traditions which contain merely historical information, even
if they refer to the biography of the Prophet. He takes these into
account only where legal conclusions can be derived from them,
This has later been stressed as a great merit of his trend, in contraSt
to those industrious scholars who, already in the early period of the
science of traditions, collected all manner of uninlportant detail of
the Prophet's biography, the contents of which often proved to be a
serious embarrassment to dogmatic theologians.
3
Thus the "se of traditions is the foremost factor in making Miilik's
work what it is. He therewith represents the transition between two
extremities which delimit the legal literature of the second and third
centuries. The starting point of the literature is mere fiqh. Miilik,
with the great influence with which he attributed to traditional
material, opened the following period. That he initiated this transi-
tion with conscious intent, that he wanted to supplement merely
positive law with historical dochmentary foundations, is shown in
his relation to a contemporary literary work with which his own
was to compete. According to Ibn 'Abd al-Barr, 'Abd al-'Aziz b.
'Abd Allah b. Abi Salma al-Majashiin (d. I64 in Baghdad) was the
first to summarize the teachings of Muslim theologians in Medina
in a codex. In this only the doctrine, the law according to Medinian
consensus, was stated without quoting any traditions to justifythese
teachings. This method did not appeal to his contemporary Miilik
and the idea of substituting for the work of Miijashiin a codex which
also contained the traditional sources of the Medinian teachings
was an additional inspiration which caused him to write the
Muwa!fa',
He was however not alone among his contemporaries in this
endeavour. How much the compilation of such a codex corresponded
to the needs of the time is seen from the fact that when Miilik set
about writing his Muwa/!a' there were many of his Medinian
colleagues who were preparing similar books. Miilik is said to have
foreseen, in the view of his rivals, the lasting recognition of his
work by posterity, full of confidence in his own work and its justi-
fication. His success indeed justified his confidence, since the
competing Muwa!!a's vanished from circulation 'as if they had falien
into a well." As far as we are aware, the sources of this branch of
1 Tahdhib, p. 629, '3, Tab.l;luff., VIII, no. 17.
!; Cf. Ibn •Abd aI-Barr in al-ZurqanI; II, p. 139_
:I Qaqi 'lyag, al.shija, II, p. 240.
• Al-Zurqani, introduction, p. 8.
[2181
202 VOLUME TWO: CHAPTER 8
likewise Malik is asked by his pupils for his own ra'y with a ra'ayta,1
which is strongly deprecated by traditionists but common in ra'y
schools.'
From all this it is sufficiently evident that Miilik b. Anas is not
properly speaking a collector of traditions in his Muwa!!a' though his
work is of the greatest interest also for specialists of the science of
hadith and represents an invaluable instrument for critical historical
investigations.
3
It is not, however, the ainl of the author to provide
such an instrument. He hintself demonstrates the material used for
his own practical ends in the versions current and acknowledged in
Medina in his tinte. Thus he is not yet troubled by the scruples of
later students of tradition of the stricter school. A proper isniid
chain is not yet considered an absolute necessity, and nearly a
third of the sayings employed by Malik are mursal or even maqtu',
Le. they do not go as far back as the Prophet but end the chain with
a name of a Companion, or else the links of a chain going back to
the Prophet are not sufficiently firm or are not closed in uninter-
rupted sequence:' '!)adiths without bridle and reins' (bi-lii kh#iim
wa-'azimma) as the critics call them. 5
Malik uses the mariisil without compunction as sources for the
law.
5
He was interested only in the documentation of the sunna and
not yet in the criticism of form.' Thus he did not spend much time
seeking its confirmation by parallel versions. The collector of
traditions in the school ainled at handing down a tradition in
various ways (!urzeq) and it became in his eyes valuable only when
he was able to illustrate it according to many !uruq. Ya!)ya b.
Mu'in (d. 233) disregarded every I;tadith for which he had not at
I Most remarkable passages lor the casuistic nature of this interrogative
formula in Abfi Yllsuf, K, al-Kharaj, p. 36, al-Muwatta', III, p. 199.
t. AIMMuwaUa', II, p. 330.
S For such investigation recourse must be had, apart from the kluwat!a',
to the traditions occurring in Abu Yilsuf (K. al-Khariij), al-Shaybani (K. at·
Siyar) and other authors of the second century; a critical comparison of these
with the contents of the collections of the next period would be very fruitful
for the history of the development of Islam.
"There is an example in al-MuwaUa', II, p. 73. [For Malik's use of ra'y cf.
also .T. Schacht, Origins of MulJ. Jurispr., p. lIj.]
" Al.Tirmidhi, II, p. 338, 21.
G Muslim, introduction, p. 64: wa'l-mursal ff a# qawlina wa.qawl aM al· 'Um
bi'l-akhbar laysa bi.l;ujjatin (for this d. the commentary by al-Nawawi and
Tahdhib, p. 285). This question is dealt with in al.Khatib aI-Baghdadi, fo1.
IOSb red. Hyde"bad, p. 384].
7 The total number of traditions of the Muwa#{a' varies according to the
different versions: it is around 1720; only 600 of them have isnads reaching
back to the Prophet, 222 are mursal, 613 are mawquf and 28j do not reach
back to the Prophet but stop at a Companion or Successor. We take these
counts from Muslim sources (al-Zurqani, I, p. 8) accepting their word for it;
it would not be 'worth while to check these statements by cQunting.
THE J!:ADITH LITERATURE 203
[2191
[2201
204 VOLUME TWO: CHAPTER 8
Arabic literary history mention three works which seem to belong
to these contempory Muwatla's. One is by the Medinian scholar
Ibrahim b. Mul>ammad al-Aslami (d. 184) and is said to have been
much larger than Malik's work.' Another is by 'Abd Allah b. Wahb
al-Fihrj (d. 197). The Muwa!!a' work of this scholar
2
appeared after
Malik's book was published and information derived from Malik
is mentioned in it.
2
The latter said of these two books: What was
done for the honour of God will last. Abu Musa. Muhanlmad al-
(d. 581) added: 'In fact Miilik's book is like the sun in its
brilliance and diffusion, while only few people know Ibn Wal1b's
book which is hard to find nowadays." Finally I found a Muwa.t!a'
mentioned' by the Medinianscho1arMuhamrnad b. 'Abdal-Rahman
b. Abi Dhib al-'Amiri (d. 120 in Kufa);'he belonged to the
of al-ZuhrI. He was ranked above Malik, with only the reproach that
he was very credulous in respect of his informants.
6
IV
Apart from the Muwa!!a' works mentioned above we also hear of
several titles of books in which the name of Malik b. Anas's work
occurs, e.g. Muwa!!a' Abi'l-Qiisim, Muwa!!a' Abj etc. Care
must be taken not to consider these as independent Muwatla'
writings and place them in the same series to which belong the
works mentioned at the end of the previous section.
(221] An unfavourable impression of the reliability of Islamic tradition
in the second century is gained if one considers that the version
in which various authorities hand down the Muwatla', all directly,
or indirectly, in the name of Miilik, differ from each other in their
text and contents, as well as in plan and order, to such a degree that
One might be tempted to think of them as mutually differing and by
no means as identical writings. Considering the accounts available
about the different versions of the Muwa!!a' and on the other hand
1 Tab. I;iuff., VI, no. 2. As late as in the sixth century a commentary was
written on thi, by Ab" Bakr b. al· 'Arabi (d. 546), l:'l.Kh., VI, p. 265.
2 Examples in al.Zurqani, IV, pp. 6I. I1g.
3 This work must not be confused with the Muwatta' revision of the same
Ibn Wahb, which is mentioned and described in the "list of Mullammad 'Abd
al-Hayy (see next section) under the no. :2 (p. Ig, top), The work mentioned in
the text is possibly identical with the K. at-Jami' of Ibn Wahb. [For fragments
of the ]{. al-]iimi' see]. David-vVeill, Le Djami' d'IbnJVakb. Cairo, r939-4I.
In a biography-ibid., p. xvii-his 'great and his commentary on
the (of Malik?) are mentioned separately.]
4 Pusey in Bodl. Cat., p. 381. The book of Ibn Wahb was used by QaQ1
'lyaq., e.g. in al.Qastallani, IV, p. 232. Tab. l;luff.. VI, no. 52 does not mention
this MttwaHa' under the works of Ibn Wahb.
:; AI.Zurqani. I, p. 16, 10 from below.
6 Tab. IJuff., V, no. 27, without mentioning the MuwaUa' work.
THE :£i:ADiTH LITERATURE 205
comparing the two versions, the full texts of which are still extant,
the belief that Miilik b. Anas made a fixed text, whether orally or by
munawala (p. 176) the object of transmission, is severely shaken. In
that case two versions of the same book could not really be so
completely different. One is much more inclined to believe the reports
showing that Miilik b. Anas freely authenticated M"wa!!a' texts
which were presented to him. The text of the book is read from
copies belonging to the students to Miilik, who listens and now and
then makes correcting remarks and then gives permission to spread
the text as coming from himself.' This wonld still permit of some
sort of control of the text. But we also hear this: Someone comes into
Miilik's auditorium and produces a manuscript from the folds of his
clothes. 'This is your Muwat,ta', 0 Abu 'Abd Allah, which I have
copied and collated; please grant me permission (ijiiza) to hand it
down.' 'This permission is granted, and when handing down the text
you may use the formula: Malik has told me, Malik has reported to
me. '2 If the author authenticated various copies of his work without
checking them it is obvious that not everything that was handed
down as being the Muwa!!a' was completely in agreement.
The commonest version of the Muwa!!a' codex, which we might
call the vnlgate, is that which is derived from the Andalusian theo-
logian and agitator Yal>ya b. Yal>ya (d. 234), a pupil
of Miilik. This version maintained its place in scholarly use and is
most often commented upon; and it is this version which Oriental
and Western scholars have in mind when they speak ofthe Muwalla'.
This version is called Muwa!!a' Ya(zya. But apart from this version
of Miilik's corpus juris there are others based on other authorities [222]
who received the Muwalla' from Malik. In all there are fifteen such
versions listed in the work of 'Abd al-J:Iayy' which we shall mention
presently. If one wishes to gain an impression of the differences
obtaining amongst these, and between them and the vnlgate of
Yal!ya b. Yal!ya., it is only necessary to remember, for example.
that in a version derived from Abu al-Zuhri, a Medinian '
theologian who died in 242, (no. 9 in 'Abd al-J:Iayy) about a hundred
traditions are mentioned which appear in no other version. though
each of them
l
in comparison with the remaining recensions
l
again
shows additions and omissions. Hardly one of them agrees with
another in respect of the beginning, and if, as sometimes happens,
1. AI.Khatib aI·Baghdadi, fo1. 84b [cd. Hyderabad. p. 309J and often else-
where as a proof that the so·called 'art! or 'ira4 is as equally valid a means of
transmission as first-hand oral lecture by the teacher.
11 Ibid., fo1. 9Ia.
3 Cf. Dozy, Geschichte dey 111auren in Spanien, I, pp. Z82ff.
4. pp. r8-21, There are r6listed but the last number is not a proper recension
of the MuwaUa', but a musnad of it (cf. below p. 2II); cf. also for the various
recensions I:I. KIl., VI, p. 267·
1 Not all versions found equal circulation; only about five were studied in
Spain, where in the third and fourth centuries the Muwafta' was studied as
the fundamental religious work. From the index to Ibn Bashkuwal, ed. eadera,
it can be seen which these versions were. Instead of Muw. al-Qa'b! in the index
as well as the text of this edition, prepared with rare carelessness. one must
always read al-Qa'nabi. (d. 2:21 in Mecca).
S The MuwaUa' copy of the treasury in Egypt (Khizanat al-Mi¥,iyyf-na)
which contained the text that the caliph Harftn and his two princes heard from
Malik presumably belongs to the domain of fable, al-Suyo.p, Ta'Yf-kh p. lIS,
zr.
S Some students of tradition study the book in diHerent versions. The bio-
graphical works offer many examples of this, I will only mention one: Ibn
al.Abbiir, ed. Codera, p. 268, S.v. 'Abd aI-Ghani b. Makki (d. 556), Muw.
Yahya . .. wa·Muw. Ibn Bukayr.
40 Within the individual books there are fewer sections, e.g. the book on
marriage in 1kfuwat!a', III, pp. Iff. has zz chapters, in Shayb., pp. z37-48
only 16, though the Muw. combines in two collective chapters (jiitni') many
questions which in Shayb. are distributed among separate sections.
G The largest additions are in Bab at.qira'at ji'l·iiilat khalj aI-imam. Shayb.
pp. gQ-Ioo=Muw., I, pp. 158-62.
we meet quotations from the Muwa.t!a' which cannot be confirmed
from the vulgate we may assume that they were taken from one of
the other versions.
1
There were thus fifteen archtypes of the Muwa#a'2, of which the
Muwalla' Yal;ya succeeded above all in gainiog predominence in
scholarly and practical use. Of the remaining versions, which for a
long time were a subject of study alongside the version of Yal;1ya
for learned Muslims," one is available to us. This is known under the
name of Muwalla' Mul;ammad and is the recension of the work
handed down by the famous pupil of Abu I:Ianlfa, Mul.Jammad b. al-
I:Iasan al-Shaybani, who lived for more than three years in Medina
and heard MaJik's lectures. It often disagrees with the recension of
Yal.Jya from which it also differs profoundly in the division of chap-
ters. Some of the chapters of al-Shaybani are not present in the
vulgate at all, and vice versa. We have already twice in this study
pointed out communications from the Muwalla' which are only to
be found in the version of al-Shaybani but do not occur in the
vulgate of Yal;1ya (p. x68 note I; p. I96). The version of al-Shaybani
as a whole is shorter' than that of Yal.Jya and the number of the
traditions included is smaller. At the same time al-Shaybani added
to nearly every chapter an epicrisis in which he notes under the
heading Qiila Mul;ammad whether the teaching contained in the
preceding chapter is valid or not according to his OW" legal system
and to the teaching of Abu I:Ianlfa. For a large part the traditions
which support the conflicting opinions are also quoted; these com-
parative additions are sometimes very large.
s
From this it can be
seen that al-Shaybani's recension is from this point of view also a
revision and a critical development of Mill's work.
[223l
206 VOLUME TWO: CHAPTER 8 THE ,>ADITH LITERATURE 207
Apart from several manuscripts the Muwa#a' Mul;ammali' is
also available in lithographic reproductions of Indian origin. I
have before me three different lithographs of this work, two from
Ludhiana
2
and one from Lucknow' which was made by the learned
Mul.Jammad 'Abd al-I:Iayy and possesses a thorough and many-
sided introduction and an extensive commentary. It may be pre-
supposed that the learned oriental in subjective partiality amassed all
kind of arguments in order to prove that the recension of al-Shaybani
was more authentic and valuable than the Muwa!!a' Yal;ya. Euro-
pean scholars, however, will be little impressed with the scholastic
arguments of this Muslim scholar.
The relation of the two recensions to each other could best be
illustrated by putting side by side the successive paragraph headings.
Since this would involve us too far, we merely take two sections
after both recensions in order to show, by comparing them, how al-
Shaybani became the commentator and critic of his text.
al-Muwalla', II, p. I9. Standing, al-Shaybiini, p. I62. Standing up
up (al-wuquf) before funeral pro- (al-qiyam) before a funeral pro-
cessions and sitting on graves cession
MaJik from
la
) Yal.Jya b. Sa'id (a) it was reported to us. (b)
from Waqid b. 'Amr
lb
) b. Sa'd b. omitted. (c) +al-An,ari. (d)
Mu'adh
le
, from Nafi' b. JUbayr Mu'awwidh. (e) singular.
b. Mut'im from Mas'ud
ld
) b. al-
I:Iakamfrom 'Ali b. Abi TaJib:
The Prophet used to stand up
before funeral processions. Ie)
Mul.Jammad says: 'We keep to
this: We do not consider standing
up before funeral processions (as
a command); at first this was so,
but it fell into desuetude.' So
also says Abu I;ianifa.
1 Cat. ar. Br. Mus., p. 7I8b; Ahlwardt, BerL Cat., II, p. 44, no. II44; Cairo
Cat. I, pp. 328f [GAL I, p. 186,51, p. zgB]. It is interesting to observe that
the Muslim cataloguer does not know that this is only a recension of Malik's
MuwaUa'; he characterizes the book thus: 'The author here writes in the
spirit of madhhab Malik and answers the objections of opponents' whereas
many additions (in the final remarks are directed against Malik's text from a
I:Ianafite point of view.
.! One in lex. Bvo from the year IZg1!Z (Printing Press of Mul).ammad 'Abd
zoo pp., with short explanatory marginal glosses; the other in Bvo
from the year 1292 (Matqa
t
Ral).imi), Z70 and 8 pp., with even fewer marginal
remarks.
I Gr. 4vo from the year 1297 (Printing Press of Muhammad Khan
412 pp.
[224]
VOLUME TWO: CHAPTER 8
V
One great step forward in the literary development of the science
of 1:ladIth is expressed in the words t a ~ n i f al-a(laaith.
By now it has become evident that the collection of 1:ladIth
material is a supremely important part of theological activities in
Islam. The more it was insisted upon that the 1:ladIth be taken into
account in legal practice as well as in ritual life and the more the
MuJ:1ammad says: We keep to this,
, since marriage is not permissible
with Jess than two (male) wit-
nesses, whereas at the marriage
which 'Umar rejected a man and
a woman were witnesses and this
is a secret marriage, because the
witnesses were inadequate in
number. If the number of wit-
nesses had been filled by the
presence of two men
l
or two
women and one man, it would
have been valid though it was
made in secret. Because what
makes a secret marriage void is
(the fact) that it is made without
witnesses; if, however, valid 'Wit-
nesses are present it is a public
marriage, even though it is kept
secret. MuJ:1arnmad also says:
MuJ:1ammad b. Abiin reported
from Jamad to Ibrahim (aI-
Nakha'i) that 'Vmar permitted
the witness of one man and two
women at marriage as well as
'divorce. MuJ:1arnmad says: and
to this we adhere and it is also
the teaching of Abu l;ianifa.
[226]
2°9
THE I:1ADITH LITERATURE
marriage was brought before
'Umar where ouly one man and
ODe woman were witnesses; so
he said: this is a secret marriage
(nika/t al-sirr) and I do not per-
mit(a) it; if my approval had (a) we do not permit.
been asked before I would have
stoned (the culprits).
- ~
-
- - ~
- - ~
(c) this paragraph is missing.
(a) upon them
az..Shaybani, p. 24I
p. I68. On the use of the grave as a
piau for prayers: whether it is
permittea to pray there ana to
stretch oneselfout over it.
(b) missing
Miilik has reported: It was told to
us by al-Zuhri from Sa'id b.
aI-Musayyib from Abu Hurayra
that the Prophet said: May God
kill the Jews(a): they have used
the graves of their prophets as
mosques. tb)
al-5haybiini, p. I68
1 Continuing the same chapter.
az..Muwalla', II, p. I9
Miilik': It became known to
him that 'Ali b. Abi Tilib stret-
ched himself 011t over the
graves
1a
) and lay upon them.
Malik says: It seems to llS that it
is only forbidden to sit on the
graves and to defile them. (h)
Malik from AbUBakr b. 'Uthmiin
b. Sahl b. l;ianif, who said that
he heard Abu 'Umama b. Sahl b.
l;ianif say: We attended funeral
processions and the last of the
people sat down until the adhan
was called. (el
III, p. I7 Collective paragraph:
what is not allowed in marriage.
[In this chapter various forms of
marriage are successively men-
tioned which are illegal and
involve nullity of the marriage
contract. In aI-Shaybani the
individual paragraphs are cited
as separate chapters; the present
is the second chapter.]
p. I9. Miilik from Nafi' from
'Abu'l·Zubayr aI-Makki: Once a
208
[This 1:ladith is mentioned in
Muw. Ya/tya in another chapter
with a different isnad-going
back to 'Umar b. 'Abd aI-'Aziz
-as 'the last thing that the
Prophet had said' IV, p. 7r.]
(a) and Christians. (b) +there
should 110t remain two dins in
the land of the Arabs.
[225]
Al-Tabarani (d. 360) is called musnid al-dunyii.'
One method of arranging !.Jadith material is connected with the
ideas regarding a perfect !.Jadith lying at the root of this title.
[228]
[229]
2II
THE !,IADITH LITERATURE
Risch, Commentar des 'lzz aI-Din, p. 28.
2 Introduction to al-Darimi, p. 4; Dictionary of Technical Terms, p. 646, 5
from below.
a E,g. the musnad of I;Iacith b. Abi Usama (d, 282) which was much studied
in the sixth century, Ibn al-Athir, VI, p. 169. In the eighth century it was still
the SUbject of critical exegetical studies, Cairo Cat. I, p, 161 [GAL S I, p. 25
8
].
The musnad of 'Abd b. l:iamid (d. 249) was still read in the tenth cent. -in
Egypt, Asanid al-Mul;.addithin, II, fo1. 6a.
'" Pertsch explains the expression musnad in this title: 'Collection of
tions for the support .of his religious teaching,' Cat, I, p, 456. See also Sprenger,
Mol;ammad, III, p, Cl, Gotha.
Ii Cf. also Mss. no. 590 and no. 609 of the same library.
6 Ahlwardt, Bed. Cat., II, pp. 97ff., nos. 1257. 1959, 1260. [Cf. GAL I,
p, 193. S I, p. 309. Printed in Cairo 1896, and a. new ed. in progress. Goldziher
devoted to the Musnad his article 'Neue Materialen zur Litteratur des "Ober.
lieferungswesens beiden Muhammedanern: ZDMG. I, (1896) pp. 465:ff.]
1 E.g. Gotha Ms, no. 589, fo1. 3ga, a special title: Abft'l.Sanabil Ba'bak with
two traditions.
8 Teacher of Dawod al-ZahirI, p. 27. Ibn Qutayba also heard
,Q.adiths from him and took over many things from him, He characterizes
thus: 'I have never seen anyone who named the adherents of ra'y
Traditions which have been tested more or less strictly for their
authenticity are sorted out from an external point of view, and those
traditions which in their isnads go back to the companions are
put together. The scholar of tradition puts together all traditions
which are. ultimately derived-irrespective of the silsila-from, for
example, al-Bara' b. 'Azib; then follow all the traditions for which
the authority is some other Companion, etc.
The principle for this type of collection is thus entirely external or,
so to speak, personal. The contents, the matter of the traditions are
not taken into consideration in establishing the order, the decisive
point being merely the name of the Companion who is mentioned
as authority for a group of traditions. Such collections are called
musnad because every single !.Jadith which in correct chain can be
traced back to a Companion, who in his tum can refer to the Prophet,
is a !.Jadith musnad, a supported !.Jadith.' From individual traditions
this name was transferred to a collection of such !.Jadiths.
2
A large
number of old musnad collections are mentioned of which we know
no more than their titles, though for a long time they were the
subject of study in Islam.
3
The most frequently quoted work of this
type is the musnad of A!.Jmad b. I:Ianbal,' of which several parts are
preserved in Ms. no. 589 of the Ducal Library at Gotha' and in a
number of Mss. of the Royal Library at Berlin.' Informants here
have been given a special chapter, even when only a very few of the
Prophet's sayings are based on their authority.7 The musnad of
Is!.Jaq b. Rahwayhi (d. 233), one of the most ardent defenders of the
!.Jadith trend at the time of the conflict of schools,8 also shows this
typical plan of a musnad collection.
9
3l1l!i -
-...:.....

VOLUME TWO: CHAPTER 8
mushroom growth of !.Jadith material increased, precisely in the
service of this postulate, the more a systematic arrangement of the
data amassed became necessary, in order to facilitate the use of the
great masses of traditional texts which accumulated in the hands of
scholars from all the lands of Islam, both for theoretical study and
practical purposes.
This systematic order was achieved by considering two different
points of view. The simplest kind of arrangement is connected with
the emerging views about a perfect !.Jadith. This must, by means of
'sound' links, be traced back without interruption (irsal, etc.) to
one of the companions; in that case it is musnad, i.e. supported.
People who collect a fair number of such !.Jadiths are given the
honorific name of al-musnid
1
and are favourite sources and centres
of !.Jadith teaching. They are visited by those who wish to become
acquainted with pure !.Jadiths.
2
'Abd Allah b. Mu!.Jammad al-
Ju'fi (d. 229), a sheikh of al-Bukhan, was given by his contem-
poraries the title al-musnad, or al-musnidi.
3
The name tm,snidis most
usually applied in connection with the name of the place or province
where the scholar concerned was highly regarded in his time and
whose people considered him almost as an oracle of the !.Jadith. One
is called musnid Baghdad, another m. Mi.r fi waqtihi
4
or, according
to the area of his authority, m. ai-Sham, m. al-Yaman,' m. al-'Iraq.
The French translators of Ibn Baltiita wrongly translate this latter
'I'appui de )' 'Iraq.' In the days when women actively participated
in !.Jadith studies' the title al-musnida is often found with women's
names.
7
The provincial limitation, mentioned above, of the epithet
musnid is in contrast with the extension of this title to the whole
Islamic world in the case of world-famous traditionists.
210
1 'Celui qui connait les traditions ct indique leur sources: Dozy, Supplbn..
I, p. 6g2b.
2 Frequently in e.g. Landberg, Cat. of the Amin Library, p.
10. In Mss. the inexact vocalization musnad (passive) is common.
:I Qiimfis, s.v. snd and Ttij al· 'Art"is a.l., II, p. 386.
, AI-Maqqarl, I, p. 550 passim.
6 Tab. l;Iuff., IX, no. 62; XVIII, no. 12.
a See Excursuses and Annotations.
, Ibn Battll't;a, II, p. lIO, Ahlwardt, Ber!. Cat. l,p. rra, ro from below; the
previous word is to be corrected to al-a§'fla (instead of al-a$liyya); the connec-
tion of the two epithets (as also for men: al-musnid al-a$U) is frequent in the
relevant literature. The same woman is often mentioned with these titles in
Asanf,d al-Jl1ttlladditMn, e.g. II, fo!' IIU.
8 Tab. l;luff., XII, no. 27; cf. imam Ii-aM al.dunya, ibid., VIII, no. 2; TahdMb,
p. 145. 9·
[227]
with greater passion, or refuted them and investigated their evil teaching with
greater zeal, than Isl;1aq b. Ibrahim He used to say of them:
They have thro'WI1 away God's book and the sunna and have abandoned the
qiyas,' Mukhtalif al·J:Iadith, p. 65; cf. p. 204.
'II Part of it is extant in the Viceregal Library in Cairo, Cairo Cat. I, p. 305
bottom [GAL S I, p. 257. For other see Goldziher, in the article
quoted in note 6 above, and GAL I, p. 163.51, pp. 256ff.]
1 Landberg, op. cit., p. 12, no. 37.
2 Originally the sequence was according to the Islamic dignity of the
companions (early acceptance of Islam, participation in the battle of Badr,
etc.), see in Diet. of Techn. Terms., p. 646.
3 This transformation was made in the Musnad of Ibn I:Ianbal, Cairo Cat.
I, pp. 168, 253 [Abu Bakral.Maqdisi, Tartlb lvI"snadAbmad, cf. GAL I, p. 193J·
• Ablwardt, BerL Cat. II, p. 5', no. 1344 [GAL II, p. 61J.
Ii AI.KutubI, Fawat al-Wafayat, II, p. 264, 21.
G Ibn al.Mulaqqin, fol. 14b; Abu 'Abd Allah al-Asamm (d. 246) is usually
named as collector.
Before going on to the second form of collections of traditions we
must add three things. First: that even at the time when factual
interests already preponderated in the redaction of 1).adith works,
musnad collections still continued to be compiled. In order to make
their use easier an attempt was occasionally made-as is the case
with the musnad of Abu'l-:E;!usayn Mul],ammad al-Ghassam (d.
4
02
)-to arrange the authorities in alphabetical order,' and older
musnad works which had been compiled in a different order" were
also changed into alphabetical order for greater convenience.
3
This appears to have been most extensively practised in the]ami'
al-Masanid wa'I-Sunan by the Damascene scholar 'Imad al-Din ibn
KathIr (d. 744).' Before him Ibn al-Najjar of Baghdad (seventh
century) wrote a comprehensive musnad work including all Com-
panions' under the title aZ-Qamar al-Munir fi'l-Musnad al-Kabir.
Secondly: that zealous disciples and members of the madhhab
extracted from the codified works of imams, which, as we saw in
respect of Miilik's in Section III, had not been meant as collections
of traditions (and had not been arranged accordingly) but as works
of legal science, as compendia of jurisprudence. the musnad traditions
occurring in them in order to make them the subject of special
studies. As far as they are known to us, however, these musnads
were arranged not according to informants but according to their
materials, corresponding to the chapters of the basic work from
which they had been taken. They are not the work of the scholars
whose names they bear. It would be wrong to think that the often
mentioned Musnad aI-Shafi'i is a collection which the Imam al-
Shafi'i himself compiled in order of the Companions cited as
informants. Rather, pupils of the Imam excepted the musnad
traditions from his codex al-Mabsu! andarrangedthembylegal topics.
THE Ti£ADITH LITERATURE 213
The Muwa!!a' of MaIik was subjected to the same process, and this
gave rise to the Musnad Muwa!!a' Malik.
'
The same is true of the
Musnad Abi Ifanifa.
2
The teachings of Abu :E;!anifa more than those
of other imams were used by the followers of his school as a basis
for musnad extracts. By pointing to the large number of musnad
traditions used by him, it could be proved that the accusation of
the opposing school, i.e. that Abu :E;!anifa in his doctrine allowed but
little influence to traditions, was untrue. Begimling with the first
companions of the ImamS until the seventh century (my data go no
further), renewed attempts were made to compile musnads from the
teachings of Abu :E;!anifa.' In the seventh century the Kharizmi
theologian Abii'I-Mu'ayyad Mul],ammad b. Mal,unud found fifteen
different musnad about Abu :E;!anifa which he collected into one
work, arranging it according to the chapters offiqh.· But his material
does not exhaust all the musnad literature of the :E;!anafite school.'
This therefore is a kind of musnad collection which is completely
different from those described at the beginning, and it must be
distinguished from them.
Thirdly: that later linguistic usage by a liberal generalization [2311
extended the term musnad to all works on tradition. At a time when
various methods of redacting traditions were no longer clearly
distinguished, works of tradition are also called musnad which in
correct usage should be called jami'. This extension of linguistic use
was gradually increased. In conversation with educated Muslims
one can hear every day-at least I found this to be so in Egypt-
talk of the musnads of al-BukharF and Muslim. The older school-
language, corresponding to a more correct terminology, has different
1 By Al)mad b. a!·Shu'ayb (d. 303). I:LKh., V, p. 543; another by AM'I.
Q3.l?im al-Jawhari al-MaIiki (d. 381) about the character of which we are told
by a quotation in in 'Abd al-l;Iayy, l.e. p. 20, see above p. 205
note 4 and Ibn BashkuwaJ., ed. Codera, p. 560, no. 1242: musnadahu fi'Z-
Muwa4#a'.
% This also disposes of the question asked in Kremer, Culturgesch., I, p.
491. note 2. [For the musnads of Abu J:!anifa see GAL It p. 77. S I, p. 286.]
a Abu'!.Mu'ayyad mentions J:1ammad, son of the Imam, Abu YOsuf [GAL,
I.e.] and aI.Shaybani among the authors of such musnad works. Fromthe third
and fourth centuries data can be found in Ibn Qutlubugha nos. 37, 42, 87.
4. The Shi'ite student of tradition Ibn 'Uqda (d. 249) also wrote a Musnad
AMI;Ianifa, al-Tus!, SM'G Books, p. 43. 2.
$ I;f. Kh., V, p. 536, Ms. of Viceregal Library in Cairo, Cairo Cat. I, p. 304.
Dr Vollers (to whom lowe a copy of the most interesting introduction) refers
also to no. 47 of the Library MU11tafa. Fa<;lil. [See GAL, I.e.; printed Hyderabad
'33
2
.J
, E.g. a collection by 'Ali b. Al;1mad al-Nahufti is mentioned in Asania al-
Mu[taddithin, I, fo1. I95b; d. Ahlwardt, Ber!. Cat. II, p. 96, DOS. 1255-6.
7 Cf. Fleischer, Leip. Cat., p. 46Sa, bottom: al-]iimi' al-Musnad al-$aMb of
al.Bukhari; cf. ibid., p. 46Sb, '2. Also Ibn Kbaldlln, Muqaddi""" p, 369, r3,
I], calls the works of al-Bukhari and Muslim musnad

VOLUME TWO: CHAPTER 8
2r2
[230J
from the start to create works which can be handed over to the
school and practical life.
We have no clear idea about the beginnings of the mU$annaj
literature. The dates quoted by Muslim authors are suspect-as we
have already pointed out (pp. 195 ff.). More positive data are
available for the third century,' from which it can be concluded that
it was at that time that people $annaja al-musnad, arranged the
m"snad according to its material,- and people appeared of whom it
was said that they were mimman jama'a wa-$annaja, of those who
collected and arranged according to subject.
3
This was also the time
when the theoretical conflict betweena{l;iib al-ra'y and a$biib al-
bad-itk reached its peak. The study of the 1).adith was highly valued
as a pious occupation, but the men who had to administer justice
in practical life lacked the means to recall in every case the teachings
of the 1,ladith and the texts from which it was derived. That practical
lawyers did not busy themselves excessively with the 1).adith can
be seen from an instructive accoUJ;lt by (d. 255), a contem-
porary of al-Bukhiiri, which gives us an understanding of how
great were the gaps which had then to be closed by the friends of
tradition. says: 'Our experience is that a person studies the
traditions for nearly fifty years, concerns himself with the exegesis
of the Koran and lives among religious scholars, without being
counted amongst the juqahii' or being able to obtain the office of
judge. This he can only achieve if he studies the works of Abu
I;Ianifa and the like and learns by heart the practical legal formulae;'
1 [See, however, the editor's note to p. 197.]
2 Deta,ils, however, such as that Na'im b.l;Iammad b. Mu'awiya al·Manvazi
(d. 228) was the first man jama'a al·musnad CTab. l;1ufi., VIlI, no. 6) do not
belong here.
a Tab. l;1uff., VII, no. 22, VIII, nos. 3, 5, 28, 99: IX, nos. 2, 4; cf. VIII,
nos. 29, 124.
4. ShuYut, d .. Dozy, SuppUm., I, p. 746a, usually together with watha'iq
or §ukuk. The knowledge of skuru! and §ina'at al.tawtMq (d. Dozy, ibid., II,
p. 779b; al-Zarkashi, Ta'Yikh al.Dawlatayn. p. 42, 10: kana /aqihan mujtiyan
'ayifan bi'l.tawtMq; ibid., p. 89, Ie: al-faqih al.muwaththiq) is one of the
pensable requisites of a practical judge, and is often dealt with in the relevant
literature. The oldest representatives of the discipline of shuruf and watha'iq
are listed in the Fihrist, pp. 206, 16; 207, 9; 208 passim; 212, 19, 22; 213,20.
made the most detailed compendia of this discipline, of which one
(cf. Ibn Qutlubugha, ed. FIagel, p. 6, 10) is in Ms. in the Cairo Library (Cairo
Cat. III, p. 102). [Cf. GAL S I, pp. 294-5. A compendium of such shunt! is the
book Bi4a'at al·Qa4i, Ms. of the Leipzig Rathsbibliothek, no. 213, and another
Ms., Cairo Cat. III, p. 8, 9: al-Amthal al·Shuru!iyya/£ TalJ£y al.wathfi'iq al·shar.
'iyya; d., ibid.. p. 266, top: MalJasin cf. the work Majmu' al.La'iq
!i'Kitiib"al·watha'iq by MulJ,ammad ibn 'Arg.iin; Krafft, Die HandschriJ1en der
oriental. Akademie in Wien,p. 174, where the documents are given which belongto
this chapter. The 58thbook of the Fatawa 'Alamgir£, the most valued of thefatwa
works of the I;Ianafite madhhab (1067), has the title: K. at.Shun'/. A collection
of shuruf is found in al-Sarakhsi, al.Mabsu!. Cairo, 1331, XXX, pp. 167-'208.]
[232]
2I4 VOLUME TWO: CHAPTER 8
terms for these last-named collections and those which are related
to them in their arrangement.
VI
A higher principle for arranging collections of traditions is found
in those redactions which are called mU$annaf, in contrast to the
musnads. This term refers to collections in which the informants to
which the isniids lead are not decisive for the order of the sayings
and accounts; it is rather the relationship of the contents and the
reference of the sayings to the same subject which are of importance
for the order. The material which is the subject of the traditions-
not only legal material, referring to ritual life, but also biographical,
historical ascetical and ethical' material-forms the scheme by which
such collections are divided. Into every chapter are put such sayings
and accounts as are transmitted in regard to a given question or
event or those from which information on the subject of the chapter
is to be derived (even if only from an incidental feature). Within a
chapter the traditions are put together with full isniids according to
all !ariqs known to the collector.- While the is. a;rranged
according to informants Calii'l-rijiil}, the mU$annaj IS dIVided ac-
cording to chapters' Calii-'l-abwiib}. We often find the name musnad
or shuyukh contrasted (from this formal point of view) with theterm
abwiib. The antithetic combination al-musnad wa'l-abwlib or at-
shuyukh wa'l-abwlib is frequent for the two types of 1,ladith collection
in works on biography and literary history.'
Musnad- and mU$annaj therefore are the two chief forms of
collecting traditions, which for a long time appear simultaneously in
literature. We have already seen that even long after the method of
the mU$annaj predominated musnads continued to be compiled.
Those who are more interested in a theoretical statement of the
traditions that they have compiled tend to write a musnad-, which is,
so to speak, an individual achievement, a repertory for private use.
Those who wish to facilitate the practical use of the accumnlated
traditions, by providing the relevant material for any given question
together in critically sifted form, produce mU$annajs. These intend
1 Inasmuch as a collection extends to this kind of material it is calledjami';
introduction to aI.Dariml, p. 4.
:r: See above, p. 202.
3 Tab. l;Iuff., IX, no. 65. in the list of works by Muslim: al.musnad
'ala'·/-rijal; ... al-jiimi' ala'-I-abwab; cf. al-Tirmidhi, II, p. 337. 7 where
Shu'ba's knowledge of traditions is compared to that of Sufyan: he was
a'lam bi'l·rijiil Fuliin 'an FUlan, the latter $liMb abwab, i.e. one stressed the
torms of isniid, the other the system in which the :Q.adith was to be used.
4. Examples: Tab. I;Iufi., X. no. 75, XI; no. 12, XII, nos. 19,23.32,47, etc.;
cf. l:.I. Kh., V, p. 540.
THE J;IADiTH LITERATURE 21
5
[233]
VII
1 K. al·J;layawan (Vienna Ms.), fol. 16a [I, 87].
2 Or al.Bukhari, Ibn BashkuwaJ., p. 227, no. 516.
3 We omit all biographical data as well as those concerned with the origin
of the better known works, since these are often repeated in the relevant
literature. As a characteristic curiosity from popularizing literature we onlywish
to quote this line: <Boukhari etait gendre de Bayezid I, sur-nomme Ilderun;
i1 mourut en 1430,' thus in Ubicini, Lettres sur la Turquie (Paris, Dumaine,
x853) I, p. 145. The author of the is here confused with the shaykh of
Bukhara. (Hammer-Purgstall Gesckic,hte des osmanisc,hen Reiches, I (r827), p.
194) Amir Sultan.
<to B. Nikao no. 24; cf. Maghiizf" no. gr, where Al).mad b. I:Ianbal is not
quoted from first hand knowledge.
6 A summary of them by Krehl, ZDMG, IV. pp. Iff.
The very first mU$annaf that gained prevalence in Islam shows
clearly the marks of this purpose: it is the $aMb
2
of AbU 'Abd Allah
Mu1)ammad b. Isma'n al-Bukhan-s (d. 256). The structure of thIs
book is that of a pure work of traditions (without addition of ra'y
as in Malik, above, p. 201) written, however, for the purpose of
enabling people to find their way with its aid in all chapters of the
fiqh and in all its problems. It was to be a means of giving concrete
shape to the teachings which then were represented in the school
of the A.1)ab a1-I;Iadith, of whom B. mentions his older contemporary
A1)mad b. I;Ianbal from personal knowledge.' This end was to be
achieved through the rubricS (tarjuma), heading each paragraph and
showing what could be deduced from this or that bab for practical
purposes, or, even further, which were the deductions to which al-
Bukhari intended the reader to pay chief attention (even if the
[235]
THE :(l'ADITH LITERATURE 217
paragraph actually contained hardly any clue to the practical use
intended); for which of the mutually opposing theses of the mailhahib
al-Bukhan wished to use the 1)adith in question as an argument.
It was therefore just!y said: fiqh
1
at-Bukhiiri Ii tarajimihi, I.e. the
fiqh of B. is in his paragraph headings.
2
This tendency of the book
also explains the fact that B. occasionally gives paragraph headings
without being able to provide an appropriate 1)adith.
3
The author
prepared a complete scheme for the whole fiqh which he tilled out
with relevant 1)adith data. If then he had no locus probans for one
or other paragraph, he temporarily left the rubric without a 1)adith,
hoping to till the gap later. For sbme of the headings, B. however
did not succeed in doing so.
We have in another study' emphasized this characteristic parti-
cularity of al-Bukhar!'s codex and shown how subjectively the
$aMb intervenes' in the questions at issue in the fiqh schools (mail-
hiihib al-fiqh), which at the author's time were more or less definitely
established. Here too we wonld like to cite a specimen for this and
can hardly find in al-Bukhari's book a more typical example to
illustrate the point than the following.
ralaq no. 24.
Bab al-Li'an and about the word of God, Sura 24:4-9. If a
dumb man accuses his wife of unfaithfulness either in writing or
by sign (ishiira, by hand) or through a recognizable movement
(ima', of the head or lashes),' he is considered equal to one who
has speech, because the Prophet has admitted sign language in
matters of religious law. This is the doctrine of some l;lijazi
teachers and also of other scholars. And God says (19:30): 'She
(the mother of Jesus) pointed to him and they said: How shall we
address him who is in the cradle, a small chIld?' And al-1;>a1)1)ak
said: (It says, 3:36: Your sign is that for three days you will
speak to men no other) than by sign, ilia ratnZan, (I.e.) only by
movements of the hands. Other people say: It is impossible (when
the person concerned cannot speak) for punishment (bailil) or
mutual curse (Wan) to take place. Then (this school) thinks that
1 Not khiffat, as in Fliigel's J:I'. Rh., II, p. 516, I, with the translation de
levitate Buc,harii in titulis.
:'. Al·Qas1:allfuli, introduction, p. 28.
B Cf. B. Ta!sf,r, no. 262; :E;.f. Kh., p. 515, Iff.
e pp. IoSff.
I> Dugat probably confused the tariijim with a supposed commentary when
saying of the 'Le commentaire qu'il ya joint est difficile acomprendre,'
Histoire des Philosophes et des thCologiens musulmans, p. 300, top.
S This is the traditional explanation in this special case, awma'a has,
however. a wider meaning in the language. e.g. A 1;kam, no. 36: awma'a
bi-yadihi; Agh., XV, p. II5. 4: awma'a ilayki bi-na'Uhi.
VOLUME TWO: CHAPTER 8 216
all this can be done in one or two years. In only a very short time
such a person will be appointed as judge over a town or even a whole
province.'!
Under such circumstances the A,,1)ab al-I;Iadith felt the need to
point to the importance of the 1)adith for religious and legal practice
and to bring practical proof that every chapter of the fiqh conld be
tilled with clear 1)adith material, so that no one can ever go wrong in
seeking the solution of religious questions of rite and law in these
sources. By this means the opposing school were to be shown that
the 1)adith was always a sufficient source for practical legal teaching.
This purpose gave the impetus to the complication of the mU$anna-
fat, and only regard for such an aim by an academic faction affords
sufficient reason for the origin of works in the context of the condi-
tions of the schools and the general trends of the time. It is no
coincidence that the mU$annafat originate in 'Iraq and the eastern-
most parts of the Islamic world, in those areas where theoretical
conflict was most violent.
[234]
1 Cf. also my article. 'Ober Geberden- und Zeichenspracbe bei den Arabern'
in ZVS. XVI. pp. 376f1.
So far the taYjuma. Then follow traditions in which it is reported
that the Prophet on various occasions used gestures and signs.'
By this example I wished to show in how unmistakable a way aI-
Bukhari tried to win over readers to a certain partisan opinion in
the headings and introductions of the chapters in his collection: in
this particular case he advocated the view of the 1:Iijazi teachers,
who claimed in opposition to the 'Iraqi party that for the validity
of certain legal acts it is not always necessary that the fixed formula
should actually be uttered.
divorce (!aliiq) can take place by writing, sign and movement;
there is no difference between divorce and accusation. If then
someone says: Accusation is only possible with words, it is said
to him: In the same way divorce can only be possible by (explicit)
speech (whereas in the last case the opposite is agreed upon),
otherwise divorce and accusation and emancipation (al-'aiq)
would be impossible. Likewise a deaf man can undertake the oath
by curse. AJ-Sha'bi and Qatada say: If he (the dumb one) says:
You are dismissed from me, by indicating this with his fingers,
then she (his wife) is separated from him by his sign. And Ibrahim
(al-Nakha'i) says: If he writes down the formula for divorce with
his hand, this is binding for him; and 1:Iammad says: If the deaf
and the dumb say this with their head (by moving it), this is ad-
missible.
1 B. l;IaJ'j. DO. 45.
I B. Iman. no. 3, cf. al-Nawawi. introduction, p. 24.
II B. Aaab, no. 13.
• a!'Qasj:a111in1. IX, p. '4.
THE IjADITH LITERATURE 2:1:9
versions are finished is the collector entitled to add: Abii 'Abd
Allah (a1-Bukhan himself) says: Bani'l-Mu!talib ashbah, i.e. 'this [237]
version seems to me the more likely one." .
The same slavish exactness is also applied to the isniid. If for,
example, in the isniid there occurs a common name born by many
people, so that the special signification of this name is not certain
in a given case, a closer identification must not simply be incor-
porated into the text of the isniid, but the addition of the specifica-
tion must be made manifest by external signs. E.g., Abu Mu'awiya
says: Dawiid, i.e. Ibn Abi Hind, reports from 'knir, who said:
I have heard from 'Abd Allah, i.e. Ibn 'AmY, etc.'" The words in
italics are additions by the collector for the purpose of identifying
Dawiid and 'Abd Allah. His explanatory gloss had, according to the _
rnles of the transmission of traditions, to be made manifest in an
unequivocal manner; and if he had not introduced the addition
with the word wa-huwa or, as is done in some cases, ya'n. ('meaning
by this'), this would have been an infringement of the fidelity of the
tradition.
Thus all subjectively learned elements are scrupulously kept apart
from the transmitted text, and the collector who took such liberties
in tendentious use of the text, and allowed himself so much arbi-
trariness and partisanship in the interpretation, took great care nQt
to alter his text by even the most minute, insignificant and often
obviously necessary corrections. It also occurs that a1-Bukbari
leaves a lacuna in his text if he obtained the text from his authority
with that lacuna. Such a lacuna is called, in the terminology of the
school, a bayiitf" the white, i.e. the blank space. Once it happened
that the exegete of the text of aI-Bukhiiri read this expression '"""
part of the text. One of the Prophet's sayings runs: inna iila Abi . ",'
laysu bi-awUyii'i, 'verily the family of Abii ... are not my
ites." Probably this is one of the tendentious traditions we have
dealt with in Chapter 3, and in some texts the lacuna is in fact com-
pleted by Abi'l- b. Umayya and in olhers by Abi Taho. PeaceahlY
inclined copyists might, in their indifferentism in regard to dynastic
issues, have wished to leave out the names altogether; al-Bukbiiri's
teacher said when reaching the missing word: In the text of Mul,1am-
mad b. Ja'far, i.e. his own source, iis written bayiitf,. i.e. a lacuna. [236]
Al-Bukhari incorporates these words of his teacher into his text.
But some exegete understood this as if the word bayiitf, was to come
after Abi, thus making the Prophet damn the family of an Abii .
Baya<;t.·

VOLUME TWO: CHAPTER 8
VIII
In al-Bukhar!'s times, and largely through his inftuence, the rules
for preserving traditions began to assume strict forms. So conscien-
tious a collector as al-Bukhari never deviated an inch from the
strictest discipline. Literal accuracy-with which people were not
overmuch concerned before (above, p. I86)-became the watchword
in reproducing what had been heard; the receiver was permitted to
pass on what he had heard, whether it was isniid or main, only in the
same form as he had obtained it. If there were any doubts about the
smallest details, these doubts had to be faithfully registered and the
decision in favour of one or the other form of the tradition had to be
noted down .part from the text. Subjective judgement in such
questions of textual criticism must never influence the text l even if
there was an obvious mistake. The collector had to write down
everything according to the words of an equally conscientious
informant. 'The Qurayshites conspired against the B. Hashim-or
against the B. 'Abd al-Muttalib.' Only after the text and all parallel
2I8
[236]
But though a1-Bukharl shows conscientious fidelity in reproducing
his text, on the other hand he does more than reproduce and group
his material. Motivated by the desire to provide, not only a usefnl
repertory of all that in his view was worth knowing and was at the
same time sufficiently authenticated, but also a handbook useful
for the practical purposes of the members of his persuasion (the
AWab a1-J;Iadlth), he also sows the seed of a commentary on his
traditions. Too much should not be made of this; but it is one of a1-
Bukh1i.rl's peculiarities, which distinguishes him from his younger
contemporary Muslim, that he does not refrain from explaining
some difficulties in the texts by glosses, which are of course kept
strictly apart from the body of the traditions. We have already seen
one such example, where a short explanatory gloss is inserted to the
text by means of a separating word. Where longer pieces are con-
cerned they are introduced at the end of the text with the words:
qala AbU 'Abd Allah. These are usually etymological, syntactical or
lexicographical" also Massoretical,2 remarks regarding single words
or phrases of the text. It is characteristic that after having quoted a
tradition he once adds: 'But this is no proof for the Qadarites."
He always thinks first of the theoretical applications for which his
material should, or should not, be used.
IX
The text of the $alzilt al-Bukhari was not handed on like the M u-
watta
l
in many recensions differing in their contents; nevertheless,
one could also make for the $altilt a large genealogical table for the
various archetypes--called mothers (ummuhat) by Muslim scholars--
and recensions derived from these.' Directly from al-BukharI's
lectures, several scholars, from amongst the many thousands hearers
who flocked together to hear from him the $altilt, have handed down
this work, and through the mediation of these transmitters and
their pupils about a dozen different Bukharl texts came into being.
1 E.g. B. Manaqib. no. 2; Jikiid, no 197; Jizya nos. 36, 37; no. 69;
Zakiit, no. 53; Ma:iiZim, no. 32 vowel a, also outside the i'Yah. in
the word al.anasiyyatu). especially abundantly in K. al.TaJs'!r, nos. 125
(wa'l.lam wa'l·nun ukhtan), 218, 330 (where the triptote is called mujzan, cf.
Fihrist, p. 74, 2';).
2 B. Tajsir, no. 263.
a Ibid., no. 265.
4 I:I. Kh., II, pp. 515, 3, 520. [For the transmission of al-Eukhari's text cf.
GA LSI, p. 261; J. Fl1ck, 'Beitrage zur 'Oberlieferungsgeschichte von BuharI's
Traditionssammlung,' ZDMG, xcn (1938), pp. 60ff.; Le '$aM{t'
reproduction en phototypie des manuscripts .. , de 10. ... 'recension' d'Ibn
Sa'ada, I, Paris 1928, introduction by E. Levi.Provenoyal (=]A, 1923, pp. 209
fI.); M. F. Sezgin, Bunari'nin kaynaklar'f, (quoted above, p. 168 note 6), pp.
I67ff.]
1 Ci. Rosen, Notices sommaires, I, p. 26, top. [Al·Y\1nini died in 701/1302,
see the studies quoted in the preceding note.] --
:I AI.QastaUani, I, pp. 46fI., provides the best information about these
archetypes and the origin of the codex of al. Yflnini. _
3 There are examples in aI.Khatib aI·Baghdadi, fo1. 70b [ed. Hyderabad, pp.
255-7] of the participation of the al.'Arabiyya in establishing the _
i'yab in ]:ladiths and of their opinion being asked in cases of lexical difficulties.
.. [Yet one should not, merely for the sake of puristic points of view, correct
odd peculiarities of the transmitted text, see Thorbecke, Ibn Durejd's KitiibJ,,(
Malahin, p. 6, note r, where a saying of al-Nas['i is quoted.]" __ - __"_-- -- - ----
r; Shawiihid al·TawrJ,!'f;, wa'/.Ta§{ti(: li·Mushkilat al·jilmi' al·$aMb, of whi9h ---=
a 1'1s. is described by Derenbourg, no. 141, I, p. 86. [Cr. GALS I, p. z6zJ. Itis
possible that this work was due to that participation in the revision of the text.
C Kkizanat al.Adab, I, p. 6, 22.
'1 Cf. al-Qas'j:allani, VII, pp. 67. 326,' on the influence of Ibn Malik in some
passages of the text.
[240]
THE <IAD1TH LITERATURE 22I
These show more or less substantial variations in the titles as well as
the contents of paragraphs. The text now commonly used is due to
Mul)ammad a1-Yiinlnl (do 658),' who took as his base a copy pre-
served in the madrasa of Aqbogha in Cairo which was itself based on
good early texts; the readings of this he compared with the reacIiIlgs
of the oldest archetypes and noted their variants.- It was a good-old
custom not to dispense with the help of philologists' in establishiPg
difficult l;1adith texts.'
At that time nobody amongst the living philologists was Il).Qre
suited as an adviser fOI a critical recension of the text of a1-Bukharl
than the author of Aljiyya, Ibn Miilik (d. 672), who in a work of his
own' has proved that he had studied a1-Bukh1i.rl from a philological
point of view. He must have been interested in a correct hadlth
text especially because he admitted linguistic forms in the l;1ad1ths
as proof (shawahid) for linguistic questions.
6
This scholar was in f<!JOt
called in as philological adviser.
7
We owe to these efforts the excellent
apparatus of variants which is preserved in the commentaries on
al-Bukh1i.rl and which cannot be too highly valued. By means of these
commentaries (a1-'Aynl, Ibn J;Iajar al-'Asqaliinl, etc.), and especially
the latest of them, by the Cairene scholar AJ:>mad b. Mul)ammad al-
Qastalliinl (d. 923), we possess the whole apparatus for the trans-
mitters of the text of a1-Bukh1i.rl, and can turn it to account in using
the text. It is impossible to come to a decisive conclusion on any
passage in this work of tradition without previously consideriDg
this apparatus of variant readings. A critical establishment of the
Bukharl text must be founded in the first instance upon the weighIDg
and sifting of the old apparatus of variant readings as it appears
in the recensions which derive from different sources of the text.
The reverence of Muslim scholars who transmitted the material in an
uninterrupted chain, up to the most recent phase of exegetical work,
has made the material for this easily accessible.
VOLUME TWO: CHAPTER 8 220
[239]
1 Examples for this in my p. 168.
• AI·Qasj:aUani, IX, p. 397.
3 Ibn al-Athir, VIII, p. 102,
l, Abl1'I.Ma}:1asin. II, p. 289. cr. Qadi 'IyaQ.. II, p. 290. [Goldziher.
Richtungen, pp. 46f.; Noldeke, Gesell. des Qorans. 2nd ed., III, pp. I Iofi.]
The l;tadith is transmitted in this form also in the name of al.Bukhan (ree. of
al.Firabri) in al·Khatib fol. 16a, bottom [ed. Hyderabad, p. 51].
• A1·Qasj:alUini, VI, pp. 88f.
7 Already Ibn Qutayba had to defend the tradition from such satires in his
Mukhtalij al-l;ladith, see Cat. Lugd. Batav.• IV, p. 55 uit. ff.
It is not impossible that some of the variants arose from dogmatic
reasons. Motivated by spiritualistic scruples, early transmitters
have for example expunged or weakened without much ado the
objectionably anthropomorphistic phrases in traditions trans-
mitted in al-Bukhari.' Pious Muslims have an easy conscience
regarding such corrections. Thus some Mu'tazilites read in Sura
II3:n, against the lextus rueptus, min sharrin (instead of sharri)
ma khalaqa, so that ma khalaqa became a negative sentence and
'the evil that He (God) created' became 'before evil that He did not
create'.' Abu Bakr ibn Muqsim was subjected to an inquisition in
322 in Baghdad for spreading such uncanonical variant readings,
and his writings were burnt." A year later a reader of the Koran,
Ibn Shannabud, was incarcerated for taking similar liberties.-
I;Iadith texts were of course less jealously guarded from corrections
due to dogmatic tendencies.
Sometimes important theological definitions depend on the
minutiae of the form of the text in a passage, as for example in the
argument about what is meant by a 'Companion' ($abib) of the Pro-
phet. In the heading of the chapter 'On the excellencies of the
companions' it reads in al-Bukhari: He among the Muslimin who
was in the company of the Prophet or has seen him, is to be counted
among the Companions (man $altiba'l-nabiyya aw ra'ahu min al-
muslimin ja-huwa min a$babihi). This 'or' (aw) is the accepted
reading.' According to it a blind man can also be counted among
the Companions, on whose authority so much depends on the l;ladith
and its religious application; and in fact we find blind men also
amongst the (e.g. Ibn Umm Maktum). On the other hand
there are theologians who do not consider these two conditions as
being alternatives but see them both-having been in the company
of the Prophet and having seen him-as necessary qualification for a
Companion. They base their opinion upon the reading wa-ra'ahu=
and has seen him. 6
Yet another series of variants belongs to the group of so-called
ta$Mjat, i.e. corruptions due to errors, a defect of these old texts
which gave scoffers opportunity for sarcastic remarks as early as the
third century7 and which from the fourth century onwards spurred
[241]
222 VOLUME TWO: CHAPTER 8
THE I;rADITH LITERATURE 223
on orthodox critics to increased care for the integrity of the sacred
texts.' Such ta$Mjat proved to be the more tenacious of life since it
was the transmitters' duty to hand on the text literally just as he
had received it, a duty which was extended by some even to evident
mistakes; what was received with mistakes had to be handed down
unchanged, though one had the right (according to others, the duty]
point out the correct readings according to one's best
m the form of oral or written corrections (in the latter case as a
separate gloss). This strict view also applied to unmistakable, lin-
guistic mistakes. In earlier days there were many defenders of the
opinion that grammatical errors and evident vulgarisms, etc., were
not to be tacitly corrected; the representatives of this view said:
hakadha buddithna. This rule did not however find general accept:'
anee, especially as mistakes in syntax (confusion of the nominative
with the objective case) often changed the sense of a saying."Tlle
need of the expounder often caused involuntary deviation from tile, [242]
mechanical strictness ofthe mere transmitter. It happens quite often
that a change was made in the text of a sentence of tradition because
the reference of the word in question was not understood and the
con:ection was intended to make understanding easier. We may
agam refer to the Muwaffa' for our example of this phenomenon in '
the history of the text. 'Uthmiin b. 'Affan once sat upon the seat
(in front of his house) when the mu' adhdhin came and invited him to
the afternoon $alttt. 'Uthmi3.n asked for water and performed the
ablution. Thereafter he said: 'Verily, by God, I will tell you a l;ladith,
if there were not a verse in the Book of God (lawla ayatfi kitttbi'llahi),
I would not tell it to you: Then he said: 'I heard God's Prophet say:
"He who performs the ablution, performs it properly and then
attends the (due) $alat, his sins will be forgiven (which he might
commit) between this and the next following $alat!'" Malik adds as
explanation that by the verse (ayat) to which the caliph refers, the-
passage in the Koran, Sura n:II6, is meant, where as reward for'
prayer remission of sin is promised.- Much more likely, however, is
the view held by other traditionists, and borne out by parallel
1 Here belongs first of all the work of Abl1 A.1;lmad al·'Askari (d. 382). which
was. described by Kremer in Sammlung orient. Hsckr., p. 43, no. 93 (cf. idem,
Ged"hte des Labyd, p. 28 [GAL I, p. '32, S I, p. '93. AI·Khatlb al.Baghdadl
(d. 463) also wrote a treatise on the ta§h!fat of transmitters, Cairo Cat. It
p. 122 bottom [GAL I. p. 4°1, no. 6, S I, p. 564, nO. 6]. The work of
qutni (d. 360) subject is not available. Some remarkable examples of
are mentloned m the Taqrfb, fol. 67a [naw 35, trans!. JA, XVIII, 1901.-
pp. II5-7]·
I Taqrfb, fo1. 58b bottom [naw 26, transl. JA, XVIII (1901), pp. 70-1].
'AI.Khaj:ib aI-BaghdadI, fols. 5Ib-56a led. Hyderabad, pp. 177"""98] dis-
cusses these questions at length; cf. ibid. fo1s. 68a-70a [pp. 245-5
2
J.
Al.Muwatta'; I, p. 61,
H
[243]
224 VOLUME TWO: CHAPTER 8
passages, that the reference is to Siira 2:I54, where a curse is called
upon those who keep secret any of God's teachings. 'Uthman :"ould
be one who keeps God's teaching secret if he had not commumcated
the message received from the Prophet.' These references to verses
of the Koran were probably forgotten by subsequent transmitters
of this story and therefore they helped themselves in trying to
understand them by changing the word iiyat into annahu. Both these
words in Arabic have the same graphic skeleton and only differ by
diacritical points. Even the oldest versions of the Muwatta' read:
lawlii annahu fi kitiibi'lliihi, Le. 'if it were not written in the book
God: and this reading was adopted in the vulgate of the Muwat!a..
The change added little to the sense of the text but the explicIt
mention of the iiyat vanished and the hearer could no longer ask
how 'Uthman could call the subsequent saying (to which the words
seemed to relate) a verse in the Book of God. ..,
Such corrections were easily made as soon as senous difficultles
appeared, and the substitution for a rare expression of a more
common one made a deeper study of the text not necessary. As a
matter of fact the text of the Koran was treated with the greatest
freedom even for the sake of small difficulties.' How much easier
was it to do so with the text of traditions, which was less sacrosanct I
On some other occasion Miilik b. Anas related the following event
from the Mediulan circle of the Prophet. A Bedouin who had paid
homage to him could not stand the city climate and was
suffering from fever. He therefore asked the Prophet to release hIm
from the oath of allegiance so that he might return to the free desert.
He repeated the request three times but the always
to grant it. Thereupon the Bedouin left the CIty Wlthout permISsIon.
When the Prophet heard about it he said: 'Verily al-Madina is like
the bellows, it removes the dirt and there shines what is excellent',
innama'l-Madinatu ka'l-kiri tanfi khabathahii (var. khubtahal wa-
fibuhii. That means: Our town repels the use:ess stuff which
disfigures it and what is geod can shine even more brJ?htly the
dirt has been removed.' We shall pass over the mmor varIatlons
which are attached to the expression of this simple idea. The ab?ve
text is the best authenticated, as is shown by the fact that Muslim,
who had received it from Yal:lYa b. Ya1).ya, the pupil of Miilik and
editor of the Muwatta' vulgate, included it in his work in this form.'
1 Muslim, I, p. 307. . "..
1 In Sura 24:27 tasfa'nisu was corrected to the easier tasta dhtnu, 73.
6
wa.aqamu into wa.a$wabu, Fakhr aI.Din al.Razi, Majatil; pp.
162, 337. In the last passage there is also quoted the OpIniOn of Ibn
according to which such changes must be comments rather than correctIOns.
3 Al.MuwaHa', IV, p. 50, cf. above p. 46, note 5·
, Muslim, III. p. 297·
THE Ij:ADITH LITERATURE 225
The literalists of later epochs did not find this text quite under-
standable. Tib is usually used of scents, but how can a scent be said
to shine? The word here ,meaning 'shine', is commonly used
of colour, not olfactory, impressions. Recourse was therefore had to
correcting !ibuhfi into tayyibuhfi,
"
which is used more generally for
all that is good, sound and pleasant. This correction does not affect
the graphic substance of the written word. More radical was the
traditionist al-Qazzaz, who corrected into yata/jawwa'u, a
word used for the exhalation of scent, whereby the meaning woUld
be 'its scent emanates'. He had merely to add one letter (w) to the
skeleton of letters and to change the diacritical points of two
letters. However, the simile of the bellows thus became rather lame.
There are many such phenomena which occurred during the trans-
mission of the text of al-Bukhari. In general the chapter headings are
the least secure part of the work from a textual point of view. As far
as they are concerned, the various recensions show the greatest
divergences. Occasionally, while otherwise they have the same text,
they show variants in single letters of a word owing to the nature of
Arabic script. In the heading of Pitan, no. 14, is the received reading
biib al-ta'arrub, Le. living in the desert like Bedouin Arabs. The
codex of Abii Dharr, a notable version of the Bukhan text, has al-
tagharrub, life abroad, far from home; another text, the variant in
which is considered as Arabscholars-evidence of howsober-
ly their critical sense dealt with such variants-has al-ta'azzub,
a word not quite suitable in this sense but which might be considered
a synonym. Another such example is in]ana'iz, no. 80. 'Ibn Samd
(the preSUllled anti-Christ) asked the Prophet: "Will you testify
that I am God's envoy?" Then the Prophet ceased to ask him about
(prophecy).' This last sentence is expressed in the text byja-raja/jahu
(he left him); for this expression, which in fact is not quite clear
(because in the further course of the story the dialogue contiQues
between the Prophet and Ibn Sayyad) there are a number of variants
in the different versions of the Bukhan text: for ja-
kicked with the foot, squeezed him,
broke his neck, for which others substituted the
entirely useless Even more variants are to be found in
Maniiqib no. 25, 'and the vessel ran over with fullness', tani¢/ju min
al-mil'i. For this the following variants are known, which I give in
the sequence of their graphic distance from the vulgate: tabi/j/ju,
tana/j/jaru, tan/jarru, tan/jariju (this is the readirIg
of Muslimin the parallel passage), taqturu. Instructive is the passage
]anii'iz, no. 78. Here Jabir tells how his father fell in the battle of
1 This is the transmitted form in B. Faq,d!il aI-Mar1!na, no. 10. He has the
tradition from Sufyan who got it from the same source as Malik (MuJ;lammad b.
al.Munkadir) .
[244]
x
According to a similar design and for the same purpose as al-
BukhiiIi, a younger of his, Muslim b. al-:f3:ajjaj3 from
NIsabiir (d. 26I), made a collection of traditions. This one is also
famous in the Islamic world under the name of al-$abib. \Vhen com-
paring it to al-Bukhari, with which it has most of the contents in
common from different oral sources, a formal difference is most
obvious; this also affords an insight into the character of this col-
lection. Muslim's work is also a and like al-Bukharl's
1 Al.QastalUini. IX, p. 509.
51 AI-DamIrl (s.v. al-qird), II, p. 290,
• [For Muslim cE. EI s.v., and GAL I, 166, S I. 265.]
U1).ud as the first martyr of Islam and shared a grave with another:
'But my soul did not wish that he should be with someone else in a
grave. So I exhumed the body after six months and, behold, he was
just as on the day when I lowered him into the grave: hunayyata
ghayri udhunihi. This is the vulgate reading of which exegetical
considerations made an inversion necessary, as if it read ghayra
hunayyati udhunihi, 'with the exception of a small piece of his ears:
This variant is found in most of the authorities for the Bukhari
text. But difficulties of exegesis gave rise to the following variants:
ghayra hunayyatinIi udhunihi, that is the logical sequence of words
demanded by the exegesis introduced into the text with the addition
of a preposition: 'on his ears'; al-SfaqsI and the source of the text of
Krehl offer hay'atuhu instead of hunayyatan=his condition (was
quite intact) with the exception, etc.
These examples, chosen from a large number, show that the need
for a tolerable sense, which the text hardly offered, unconsciously
gave rise to alterations which appeared shortly after the canonical
text was fixed in the earliest recensions. Partly these talre the place
of true corruptions in the texts, but in their multiplicity they show
that they were attempts to offer something better or more plausible,
and we feel we can share the opinion of Muslim critic that ignorant
copyists bear the greatest responsibility for the fact that often one
has to interpret the text in a tortuous manneL' Apart from these
variants we must also mention interpolations, from which al-
Bukhiiri's text did not escape. With regard to an account from the
Jahiliyya which AbU Mas'lid al-DimishqI (d. 400) cites from al-
Bukharl, al-:f3:umaydi (d. 488) remarks in his work ai-Jam' bayn
al-$abibayn (Harmonistic of the $altibs): We have looked up this
passage and found it in fact in some copies of the work 'concerning
the days of the Jahiliyya', but not in all of them. It possibly belongs
to those passages which have been interpolated into the BukhiiIi
text (al-muqbamat)"
[245]
[245]
226 VOLUME TWO: CHAPTER 8
THE Jj:ADITH LITERATURE 227
parallel work is arranged according to the chapters of thejiqh, but the
various paragraphs (abwa"b) in the original edition of Muslim himself
have no headings.
l
Thus Muslim also, like his contemporary, in-
tended to serve the jiqh through his work but he left it to the reader
to draw from the collected !;tadIth material the conclusions
seemed to him to correspond most closely to the truth. Another
formal difference, which was particularlyevident to Muslimscholars,3
also finds its reason in lliat difference between points of view of the
two collectors. Both made it their business to give the same !;tallith
according to various turuq (i.e. according to different informants with
different isnaas), since a !;tadith is the more authenticated the more
parallel versions it has.
3
\'!hereas, however, al-Bukhari often quotes
llie different parallel versions of the same tradition under different
chapters (because the same text serves him for various chapters of
the jiqh and because he had no other material for some of the
paragraphs but the traditions which he had already used previously).
Muslim always quotes related versions together without repeating
material that has already been dealt with. His purpose was not
a priori to equip the whole scheme of jiqh with !;tadith material.
We may therefore deduce that Muslimwas not primarily concerned
with the practical application of his collection in a particular direc-
tion but intended, as he says in his preface, to purify the existIng
!;tadith material of all dross: the unreliable and untrustworthy
elements which had attached themselves to this material in the
course of time.
4
Also the fact that he does not start his work without
any intrOduction, like his older contemporary and colleague, but
prefaces his work with a number of introductory chapters (which ..re
highly instructive for these studies), about the view-points_of
collecting traditions in general and on the grade of trustwortlliness [247]
of transmitting informants and on authentic and non-authentic
!;tadiths, corresponds to this intention.
The two $ab'bs represent, for the first time in the literature, a
more rigorous criticism of the isnaa than that customary in the
preceding period. Previously it was considered sufficient if the isnaa
chain was entirely made up of names of thiqat, i.e. informants known
as reliable; only now the inner coherence of the isnad, the unctu-.L
relationship of the thiqat which occur in them, begin to be tested,
and the admission of traditions as legal sources is now m,,-de
n
1 p. 103.
! Al·Nawawi, introduction, p. 10, top.
a See above, p. 202, Yal;l.ya. b. Mu'in. _
"I. p. 33: 'In face of the facts reponed to you that the people spread
objectionable accounts by means of weak and unknown isniids and throw
these among the ordinary public who cannot discern these faults, our heart
was willing to grant your wish.'(This introduction is in the form of an addr-ess
to an unknown person.)
---c:-__
1 Tahdhib, pp. 360, 406, 507, mushabbak al-dhahab.
to For a bad isnad there was a scheme too: Mu];lammad b. Marwan: al-
Kalbi: Abu $aUl}.: Ibn 'Abbas; this chain was called sil,silat al-kadhib (chain of
lie), al.Suyftti, Itqan, II, p. 224.
1I Ahlwardt, Bcd. Cat.Il, p. 274, no. 1623.
.. Al-Bukhari also demanded that the informants be not credulous but able
to distinguish 'sound' from 'diseased' ij,adiths, al-Tirmidhi. I. p. 74·
contingent upon isntids correct in this sense. Ya!)ya b. Mu'in gives
as an ideal for a correct isniid, 'Ubayd Allah b. 'Umar: al-Qasim b.
Muhammad: A"isha: Muhammed; this is"iid he called: 'Gold inlaid
with pearls' (aZ-dhahab aZ-mushabbak bi'l-durr). The isntid chain,
Malik: Nafi': Ibn 'Umar, is given this preference and the above-
mentioned name by al-Bukhari;' it was also called the 'golden chain'
(siZsilat aZ-dhahab)? and later forty-seven !)adiths were put together
whose isniid deserved this honorific title.
3
In general, however, there
was no fixed canon for the relative evaluation of isnad chains in the
third century; each collector had his own norm. One speaks of the
shuru! (conditions) aZ-Bukhiiri and shuru! Muslim, i.e. the demands
that each of the two made of a tradition before incorporating it into
his $aM/I. If one of the traditions collected by them did not comply
with their sh'm7!, it was put aside as an insufficiently authenticated
source for the law.
Nobody will expect us to present here all the differences between
the shuru! of the $a/li/ls. Anybody desiring a more profound know-
ledge of this subject can obtain it from the native introductory works.
We will only point out the chief difference, since it also serves to
throw some light upon the study of traditions amongst Muslims in
general. It is generally agreed that a !)adith which is to serve as
argument for a legal doctrine (/lujja) must necessarily have an isniid
in which all the informants who are mentioned are indubitably
reliable thiqiit,' and that, as regards its inner cohesion, it must have
that continuity which is termed itti,iiZ, uninterrupted cohesion. This
consists of the proof for the contemporaneity of the informers who
are represented as receiving traditions from each other and that
there was personal contact between the man handing down and the
man receiving. Such conditions of the tradition are usually marked
by the formula sami'tu, /laddathani, or akhbarani. A says: 'badda-
thani or akhbarani B', who says: '/I. or akhb. C, etc., up to the
Companion who makes the communication from direct contact
with the Prophet. This is the isniid form of an 'uninterruptedly
connected' I;1adith. Various forms of 'interrupted' !)adiths must be
distinguished from this. Intermediateis the so-called badithmu' an' an,
i.e. a hadith which is attached to an isniid in which the infor-
mants .or part of them are not linked by the above-mentioned
itti,iiZ formulae but merely by the preposition 'an=from, e.g.
[248]
228 VOLUME TWO: CHAPTER 8 THE J;[ADiTH LITERATURE 229
A 'an B.' Contemporaneity of the two informants is proved if
there is no doubt about the veracity and reliability of A.; but does
the presumption of contemporaneity alone establish the itti,iil of
the badith mu' an' an? Here is the difference of the shari Muslim
from the shari al-Bukhiiri. Whereas, according to the 'conditiolls'
of the first, the itti,iiZ is presupposed for a/ladith mu'an'an," the latter
demands that, before such mu'an'an can be put on a level with a
correct uninterrupted isniid, it should be proved that the two in-
formants known as contemporaries had been in immediate personal
contact.' Otherwise it could happen that A communicates bona fide
from ('an) B, without having heard the account from him but ollly
through an intermediate person, who is not named.
XI
The period Which, as we have seen, favoured the creation of the
mu,annafiit also provided Islam with other such collections apart
from the two $a/li/ls. We shall discuss them all together because in
their contrast to the $abi/ls they fall into much the same category,
and because together with them they form the canonical literature
of tradition in Islam. We mean (I) the Sunan of Abu Dawud frQm_
SijisHin (d. 275), (2) the Jiimi' oj Abu'Isa Mu!)ammad al-Tinm].hi
(d. 279); 8) the Sunan of Abu 'Abd al-Ra!)man al-Nasa'i (d. 303);
and (4) the Sunan of Abu 'Abd Allah Mu!)ammad ibn Maja from
Qazwin (d. 283).' As is evident from the dates of their death, the
first two were contemporaries of the authors of the two $aM/ls;
Abu Dawiid, pupil of A!)mad b. I,Ianbal,
5
appears to have written
his work independently from them; al-Tirmidhi was a pupil of al-
Bukhari and of AI;1mad-he also studied under Abu Dawiid-and in
his work frequently refers to his teachers and their oral communica-
tions.
s
These works are usually bracketed together as the four Suni",
though al-Tirrnidhi's work may by right be called aJiimi' owing to
its contents.' By Sunan such collections are meant as concern
1 Risch, p. 29,
2 Al-isniid al-mu'an'an lahu J;ukm al-maw§t"U bi-sami'tu bi-mujarrad kawn
al.mu'an'in wa'l·mu'an'an 'anku kana f t ' a ~ r wlU;id wa'in lam yutlJ,J)(l,t
ijtima. 'uhumii.
3 AI.Nawawi, introduction, pp. 10, 20,
'rSee Bl S.vv. and GAL 1,168.169,170.1]1. S I. 266, 26], 269, 270.]
l Ab"ii Daw"iid, I, pp. 20, 42; II, pp. 30, 4I.
G He cites with preference their critical judgements on their informants: -
al-Bukhari is also frequently a direct source from which T. takes ];ladiths,
I, pp, 38, ]3, 120, 125, 129, 134, 135; II, PP' 72, etc. He always calls him
simply MuI;lammad b. Isma'il while other people of this name are marked qya
nisba, e.g, M. b. I. aI-Vlasiti, I, p. 174.
, Cf. H. IGl., II, p. 548, bottom.
[249]
[250]
VOLUME TWO: CHAPTER 8
themselves, to the exclusion of historical, ethical or dogmatical
sayings, only with the sunna, the law and legal customs, and 1.ladiths
referring to them, in fact with what is usually called al-l;aliil wa'l-
l;ariim (what is allowed or forbidden)' or al;kiim. These works differ
in their contents from the two $a/ti!zs only in that they are chiefly
concerned with legal traditions.
2
There is, however, an even more
marked difference which they share among themselves in contrast
to the two $a/til;s, in that their shuru! show a greater liberality;
not only as affects their judgement of the inner coherence of isniiils
but also of individual informants (rijiil) occurring in them. Without
this liberality it would hardly have been possible to find traditional
guidance for all points of legal practice, since, as al-Baghawi so
rightly remarked, the largest part of the al;kiim does not rest on
entirely 'sound' !)adiths, but also uses 'beautiful' !)adiths, i.e. at best
those of second class.'
Whereas those two classics of the science of traditions only
admitted those rijiils of whose veracity and reliability there was full
agreement, and banned from their list all those whose authority
might be impugned or doubted in any way, AbU Diiwiid, and his
pupil al-Nasa.'i after him, turned this rule into a negative form.
They were satisfied with informants as long as they were not un-
animously condemned. Ibn I:Iajar, in attempting to interpret the
thoughts of these collectors, says that critics of informants were in
all periods either extremely rigorous or more tolerant in their judge-
ment. In the first period there are Shu'ba and Sufyan al-Thawri, the
first being even stricter than the second; and in the second period
Yahya al-Qat!all was the representative of the strict school and
Yahya b. Mahdi representative of the tolerant group; in the third
period Ya!)yii b. Mu'in adhered to rigorous standards, whereas
A!)mad b. I:Ianbal was a more tolerant critic. Finally in the fourth
period AbU I:Iatim is even stricter than al-Bukh1i.ri. AI-Nasa'i then
says: 'I do not condemn a tradition until all critics are in agreement
abollt its worthlessness. If Ya!)ya al-Qattan rejects it but Ibn Mahdi
1 Cf. Ibn Hisham, II, p. xviii, 4 and note. An example is also found in al·
Khatib aI-Baghdadi, foL 38b top red. Hyderabad, p. 134J where Ibn 'Uyayna
is cited to the effect that from Baqiyya one must not hear rna kana Ii sunna
but one may hear mii kana Ii thawab wa-ghayrilli. i.e. legal in contrast to ethical
and historical {Ladiths. Sunna, in contrast to zuhd and adab, Tab. l;IttJf., VI,
no. 37, see-also p. 73 above.
I!: Because agadic and dogmatic 1).adiths are not strictly excluded; to cite
but Abu Dawiid, In II, pp. 168-208, many I;1adiths are collected which do not
quite belong to the system of the sunna, e.g. p. 175 about qadar; p, 180 fS
khalq al-janna wa'l.nar; p. 174 has a chapter with the heading aI-daW 'ala
al-ziydda on the dogmatic argument whether the terms 'more'
or 'less' are applicable to faith.
3 Introduction to al-Sunna; akthar aI-al;kdm thuMUuha bi-#ariq
!}asan.
THE I;iADITH LITERATURE 23I
accepts it, I accept it, since it is known how strict that theolog;an
was in his judgement."
But it was the other pupil of AbU Diiwiid, al-Tirmidhi, who chose
the most practical point of view of all collectors. He accepts any
tradition which is known to have served as proof or argument for a
lawyer in legal practice, in other words, every sentence to which
at any time reference had been made. If the authors of these collec-
tions were more liberal in their acceptance of 1.ladiths thanJhe
authors of the two $al;il;s, they had at the same time a fur_ther
task. It must not be thought that they registered the colleded
traditions as perfectly equal and indisputable material for Islamic
law. At every step-and no page of these collections is without this-
we find remarks, added by the collector to the 1.ladith cited, that in
the isniid one or another of the informants was weak, that impro-
habilities or impossibilities occur in it in so far as the tIansmitters
mentioned as contemporaries did not live at the same time or
could not have been in touch with each other, etc.
A few examples will show the way in which these collectors add
their criticism to the collected material:
AbU Diiwud, I, p. 20. This is an objectionable (munkar) 1.ladith;
nobody has transmitted it but Yazid al-D1i.l1i.ni from Qatiida
(from AbiJ.'I-'Aliya) ... Shu'ba said: Qatiida has obtained
four 1.ladiths from Abi1l'-'Aliya2 ... Abu Diiwud says: I have
shown the hadith of Yazid al-D1i.lani to Ahmad ibn Hanbal
but he rebuked me' since he considered it as an fake;
he said: What does Yazid al-D1i.l1i.ni do amongst th" companions
of Qatada; he was not concerned about the 1.ladith-p. I07. A.D.
says: T'ariq b. Shihiib saw the Prophet but heard nothing from
him-po I3S. A.D. This 1.ladith is not strong (qawi), Muslim b,
Khiilid is weak (rJa'if)-p. ISS. A weak informant, both 1.ladiths
are false (wahm)-p. I97, after an isniid: al-Jfajjaj 'an al-Zuhfi:
This is a weak 1;adith, al-I:Iajjaj never saw al-Zuhri and n,,-ver
heard from him, Ja'far b. Rabi'a also never sawal-Zuhri and only
corresponded with him-po 22I (al-Awza'i: 'Atii: Aws): 'Ata'
never saw Aws who was one of the warriors at Badr and died
early; the 1.ladith is mursal.
II. p. 30. A.D. says: This is an objectionable 1.ladith, I have
heard that A1.lmad ibn I;Ianbal rejected it strongly (yunkir
1 Al.Bajama.'wi's introduction to aI·Nasa'i (Cairo, 1299), p. 3.
I The four sayings are quoted here but the one in question is not among
them.
• Intaharani isti':aman lahu, d. Dozy, s.v. 'ann X. Cf. also from IV: B
(ed. Krehl, II, p. 313. I): man za'ama anna lJubammadan ra'a rabbakufaqad
a':ama.
H'
[251]
, Ibid.• II. pp. 245--255.
• Ibid.• pp. 95-'7.
* In al-TirmidhI, I, p. 229, the introduction to a document is given whis:b. is
made out at the sale of a slave (by the Prophet!) .
.. Agh., XVIII, p. 181, bottom.
• Cf. ZDMG. XXVIII, pp. 67,11.
traditions for the more popular manifestations of religious feeling;
see for example the many paragraphs on various isti' adhrit.' On the
purely legal side it may suffice to mention in this connection -{hat,
in the chapters on various contracts, the formulae for promissory
notes, dissolution of partnership (tafarruq al-shurakri), divorce bills,
documents of manumission of slaves (of all three types; 'atq, tadbir,
muMtaba) are alike given in extenso.' There are probably no older
formulae for this type of legal transactions,' as in generaLthe
written formulation of contracts was ouly regulated in Islam at a
late date (see above, p. 2rS note 4). Duringal-Ma'mun's times wrEtten
documents concerning the buying and selling of slaves were not yet
generally used.-
Since in these works everything that seemed applicable in any way
was collected, it is not surprising, considering the nature oLJhe_
material, that within one and the same chapter the sayings usedmay
contradict one another. In fact these Sunan collections frequently
quote a series of traditions in which a strict norm is established in
conformity in different versions; this is then followed by another
flow of opposite traditions in favour of a more lenient practice
in respect of the same legal question. Representatives of the
opposing teachings thus had a repertory for their opinions in
traditions which presumably originated when these teachings
required a traditional support to authenticate them.
Al-Nasa'! has the advantage of offering us in the diversity Qt his
material some idea of the extent to which the fixing of ritual and
legal normS in the schools had grown by the third century an,l of
showing how finuly certain customs, habits, superstitious obser-
vances connected with religion, had been established. AI-Tirmidhi
on the other hand gives us an opportuuity to learn of the divergencies
of the madhahib in respect of the most important points of religious
practice. Al-Tirmidh! proves to be a true continuator of the tenden-
cies of his teacher al-Bukhari. Al-Bukhan as we have seen colleCted
and arranged the l].adith from the point of view of his system of
fiqh; al-Tirmidhi went further than that. He notes down, for each
tradition, which madhhab teaching it is intended to support, and
what the opposing madhahib coUId use to counter it. In this respect
al-Tirmidhi is one of the oldest, and amongst those available surely
the oldest, source for comparative research into the divergencies of
orthodoxfiqh schools,' and he must be added as such to the literary
[254]
-233 THE 1;!ADITH LITERATURE 232 VOLUME TWO: CHAPTER 8
hridhri'l-badith inkaran shadidan). p. 4I. AbU Salil;! inserted be-
tween himself and Abu Hurayra an informant Isl;1aq Mawla
:la'ida. p. 92. This l;1ad!th Ja'far never heard from al-Zuhri; it
is objectionable.'
[252] Such remarks are even more frequent in the later Sunan than in
Abu Dawiid and the critical remarks of the authors of such collec-
tions may be regarded as the first literary witnesses of what is called
criticism of traditions. We find in al-Tirmidhi for the first time a
classification of the traditions which he collected by giving each of
them the determination basan, or basan according to
their value.
Whereas, by the limitations which al-Bukhari and Muslim im-
posed on themselves by their strict shuru!, the area of the
is much reduced for them, the authors of Sunan works acquire large
number of traditions which they can utilize in the chapters of legal
science. This is most clearly seen when one considers that, while
Muslimstressedthat he did not even incorporate all the sound!)adlths
but his scruples omitted some material of this kind whose authentic-
ity was not confirmed by the ijma'" the Sunan works quote many
traditions the weak authority of which they themselves had to
attest. ThUs whereas the old found it hard to compile
sufficient traditions for the chief points of legal life-so that, for
example, al-Bukhar! was unable to adduce traditions for some rub-
rics of his scheme (see above, p. 2r7)-the second layer of works on
tradition shows an attempt to find traditions even for the minutest
details of religious laws. This could easily be achieved by authors
who showed great tolerance for traditions which they themselves
called objectionable or 'weak'. AI-Nasa'! in particular extended his
collections to the finest subtleties of every legal point, and in the
ritualistic chapters he exults in pedantry. All du'as (silent prayers)
which are to be said between the single rak'as are textually quoted.-
All these different formulae-fourteen texts in one case-are linked
[253] to the authority of the Prophet. He even adduces a great number of
1 Abu Dawild therefore at the repeated examination of his materials did not
reintroduce any of these objectionable traditions, e,g.. I. p. 91, Abo. 'Ali (the
editor) says: A.D. did not read this :Q,adith at the fourth 'u"4a; II, p. 30 the
same in respect of the second 'uraa, referring to the tradition quoted in the
text.
t TaqYlb, fo1. 36b [naw 2, trans!. lA. XVI 1900. pp. 501-2] points out that
these determinations were confused in the various Mss. of al-Tirmidhi so that
only by collating reliable Mss. (bimuqabalat a$lihii bi urul can one
refer to such determination of traditions by al-Tirmidhi.
I Muslim I, p. 10: laysa kuZlu shay'in $aJ,Z1}in 'inti{ watja'tuhu hahuna
wa·innama warJa'tu hiihunfi. mfi. ajma'u 'alayhi.
.. AI-Nasa'i, I, p. 79, the rules on the Friday-khu#ba are given in minutest
detail, pp. I'24:ff·
vincial judges ([I,ukkam al.afiiq) who administer the oath 'ala'l.mu{7}a/-
Reference to a similar action by Ibn al.Zubayr can hardly be
Khallikan, no. 732, ed. Wiistenfeld, VIII, p. 106, d. Usama b. Munqidh, ed.
Derenbourg, p. 18, 14: wa'sta[l,la/ahum
People read it in times of tribulation in the hope of finding deliver-
ance from their difficulties; they believe that a ship which has it on
board is safe from sinking, etc.' Though Muslim's book was never
thus honoured and though no superstitions regarding speCial
privileges became attached to it, both books are counted equal as
sources of law and are collectively referred to as al-Saltil;tan:"""At
first the Sunan work of Abu Dawud, which appeared simultaneously
with the two Saltil;ts, might have been a serious rival. The author
appears hinlself to have been the first to trumpet forth its fame,
extolling the virtues of his book. A letter exists' which A.D. ad-
dressed to the theologians in Mecca in order to characterize the
critical principles of his collection and explain the points of view
which he followed in his choice. In this epistle he says: 'I know no
book, apart from the Koran, which it is as necessary for men to
study as is this book. Likewise no one need acquire any book in
addition to this. He who reads and studies the book and endeavours
to assimilate its contents thoroughly will grow to understand its
value.'3 This judgement of his own achievement' is echoed by
younger contemporaries and later successors who already had the
two Saltil;ts at their disposal. His pupil Zakariyya al-Saji (d. 306)
says: 'The Book of God is the foundation of Islam and the Sunan
book of Abu Dawiid is the supporting pillar." Even more extra-
vagant is al-Khatlabi from Ceuta" (d. 388). He says: 'Know 1!Jat
this is a noble book, the like of which does not exist in the field of
religious law. It was accepted by the people and became the arbiter
between opposing parties, and schools of scholars and lawyers. ISlam-
ic science in 'Iraq, Egypt and the Maghrib, and many other regions
of the world is founded upon it. Before Abu Dawud people wrote
jami's and musnads and the like; these books contain, apart from the
sunna and the law, tales, accounts and exhortations and material
relating to good habits. But, as regards the mere Sunan, of
Abu Dawiid's predecessors collected them and put them together
1 I;I. Kb., II, p. 520, 2.
Z The same is also cited by Ibn Khaldltn, Muqaaaima, p. 261, 8:/i risfilcitiki
al.mashhura.
S Mukkta$ar of the commentary of al.Suyo.ti (Cairo, 1298), p. 3.
.( Al.Tirmidhi is also said to have recommended his own book in similarly
boastful terms: 'He who has this book in his house is in the same positionas if
he had harboured a real prophet.' H. Kh., II, p. 548, bottom. =-
, Tab.l;iuff., IX, no. 66.
$ [AI-Khat\;abi is not from Ceuta, but Bust in Sijistan; the error is no doubt
due to the similarity in Arabic script of al·Busti and al-Sabtl.]
234 VOLUME TWO: CHAPTER 8
history of this branch of the study of Islam. It should be noticed
that in this comparative representation almost no regard is paid to
Abu I;Ianifa. T. often shows himself in his work as an opponent of
the al-Ra'y, but nowhere more clearly than in the passage
where, with reference to a given text, he contrasts the bid'a of the
advocates of ra'y the sunna by citing Wald'.' The Sunan works
seek to exhibit the fiqh of the al-I;Iadith, those juqahCi'-as
al-Tirmidhi hinlself says on one occasion-that best understand
the sense (i.e. the application) of 1).adiths.'
XII
We must anticipate here the historical development of the litera-
ture of tradition in order to describe, for the sake of gaining a better
understanding of the position and influence of the works on tradition
so far mentioned in the religious and scholarly life of Islam, the high
rank accorded to the mU$annajat characterized in the preceding
sections.
The two saMl;ts occupy a quite exceptional place. When they first
appeared the two works had to compete for first place in public
preference, and in different provinces and circles of Islam sometimes
the one and sometimes the other of the almost contemporary works
were preferred. Muslim was praised (the Maghribis showed an
inclination to this) for his better arrangement, al-Bukhari for his
greater care over his shuriN and perhaps also the greater usefulness
of his work for practical purposes. Public opinion eventually de-
clared for the pre-eminence of al-Bukhari. In the fourth century
the Khurasani Shiifi'ite Abu Zayd al-Marwazi (d. 37I) makes the
Prophet in a dream vision in Mecca expressly call the]ami' of
Mu1).ammad b. Isma'il (al-Bukhiinl· his book, and with the passing
of time this veneration increased to such an extent that al-Bukhari
became almost a hallowed person in Islam. Pilgrimages were made to
his grave in order to gain help in difficulties, his sal;il;t became a
[255] sacred or at any rate privileged book' on which-€specially in
North African Islam'-people swore as otherwise ouly on the Koran.·
1 AI.Tirmidhi, I, p. 171, 20.
2 Ibid, p. 185.5: al-fuqaha: wa.num a'lam bi·ma'iinf al·badfth.
a Tahdhib, p. 720, bottom.
"Special prayers are prescribed for the completion of the reading of this
book which, like the khatma of the Koran, is customary on solemn occasions:
du'a' khafm al-BukhiirJ, Cairo Cat. II, p. 135. 17-
Ii Walsin Esterhazy, De la domination tuyque dans l'ancienne regence d'Alger
(Paris, 1840), pp. 213. 222 [d. also the references in GA.L S I, 261].
$ The oath on the itself only became usual in later times. It is not
found in old formulae of oaths which occur in abundance in historical writings.
The oldest available reference is that al-Shaf'i mentions the usage of pro-
THE J;IADITH LITERATURE
235
[256L _
[257]
236 VOLUME TWO: CHAPTER 8
so completely and nobody was able to offer them so concisely from
so many extensive traditions as Abu Dawiid intended to do and in
fact did, Therefore his book is regarded as a wonder of the world by
the greatest authorities of the science of tradition,I and therefore long
journeys were undertaken in order to study it.'" Abu Dawiid's
work did not however succeed in gaining preference over the two
$aMbs in the eyes of the public.
It would be wrong to think that the canonical authority of the two
$aMbs is due to the undisputed correctness of their contents and is
the result of scholarly investigations. The authority of these books
has a popular basis and holds good in spite of the free scrutiny of
individual paragraphs. Nor does it refer to an indisputable correct-
ness of the contents (the details of which may always be and have
been, the subject of criticism), but to the obligation to consider
the contents of the $aMbs as authoritative in religious praxis (al-
'amal)," The popular basis for this authority is the ijmii' al-um,na,
the unanimous collective consciousness of the Islamic community
(talaqqi al-umma bi'l-qubUl), which elevated these works to the
heights which they attained.' Despite this general recognition of the
$aMbiin in Islam, the veneration never went so far as to cause free
criticism of the sayings and remarks incorporated in the collections
to be considered impermissible or unseemly.
There is quite a body of literature of criticism against the $a!;ibs.
Abu' 1-I.Iasan 'Ali aI-Daraqutni (d, 385) wrote a book, Criticism and
Investigation (at-IstidriikiU wa'l-Tatabbil'), in which weaknesses of
two hundIed traditions incorporated in the $ailibs are proved. Free
utterance of critical doubts concerning some passages of the canoni-
cal collections of traditions is very common. We have already seen
(p. I04) an example of what ruthless expressions pious and reverent
theologians use to condemn a !).adith accepted by aI-Bukhari.
Whereas this was concerned with a question of no importance for
religious practice, we can point to a ritualistic !).adith in aI-Bukhiiri
5
which through mediation of aI-Awza'i is referred back to a Compan-
ion ('Amr b, Umayya). AI-A,ili, qii¢i of Saragossa (d. 390), says of
this !).adith that it is an erroneous report which is not mentioned at
all by reliable informants.
6
It is less surprising that philosophers like
1 balla, in::>tead of jalla of the edition.
: TahdMb, pp. 710, 7I2.
, Ibid., p, 95, I.
4 Cf. esp. al·Nawawi, introduction, pp. I3ff, Ibn Khaldiln, Muqaddima,
P·37I.
5 Waqu'; no. 50 (ed. Krell!, 49); this concerns a report whereby the Prophet
recognized the use of a head-cover as substitute for head washing, as is usual
in the case of masll al·khuffayn. The I;Ianbalite rite recognizes the practical
validity of this; al'$afadi, Ral),mat al·Umma, p. 8.
, Al.Qastalliini, I, p, 325,
THE I,IADIJ;H LITERATURE 237
the Ash'arite aI-Baqillani, followed in this by Imam aI-I.Iarantayn,
aI-Juwayni, and al-GhazaIi, reject a !).adith recorded by aI-Bukhari
'
and label it as untrue" This free attitude towards the contents of
the $abibayn lasts right into the time when veneration of it, parti-
cularly of the $alpi!; of aI-Bukharl, exceeded by far the reverence
shown to the other highly respected works. Ibn al-Mulaqqin (d,
804) did not hesitate to remark of a passage in aI-Bukhari:" 'This
is a strange saying; if al-Bukhari had spared his book this, it might
have been better," nor was any pious person likely to take umbrage
of such language. Veneration was directed to this canonic work as a
whole but not to its individual lines and paragraphs. This reverence _.
had its root in the ijmii' al-umma' and it is very characteristic oUhe [258}.
authority of the ijmii' that orthodox theology also asked for _
nition by the ijmii' in regard to details of this work before accel'-ting: . _
them as sound. 'The shaykh (Le. Ibn aI-Sala!)., d. 643) teaches1Itat
what is transmitted by both or one of them is absolutely right
(maqlu' bi-§i!;batihi) and that apodictic knowledge (aI-'ilm al-qat'i)
follows from it. But seekers for the truth, and most scholars, con-
tradict him in this respect and say that only presumed knowledge
(al-;ann) is involved as long as its recognition is not confirmed by the
tawiitur (uninterrupted recognition by all generations." These_
words by aI-NawawF characterize the point of view of Islamic
orthodox theology towards these highly esteemed works, whose
absolute unimpugnability men attempted to establish as law, as
can be seen fromthis citation.
XII!
The veneration of Muslims extends, in addition to the two $abil;s,
also to the above-mentioned four Sunan books. Under the name
al-kut"b al-sitta, 'the six books', they comprise the canonical!).adith
literature and as such form the main sources for traditional law. It is
likely that in the days when general need produced these six books
other similar books were written. But these could not establish
themselves in use, or if they continued to circulate they
attain the same authority. This last statement is true, e.g. of the
Sunan work of Abu Mu!).ammad 'Abd Allah aI-Darimi aI-Samar-
qandi (d, 255), which is also called Musnad at-Diirimi' in the ex-
1 Tafs1r, no. IIS, to Sura 9:8r.
2 Al.QastaIUini, VII, p. 173.
3: Nika.l)" no. 24.
4. AI.Qastallani, VIII, p. 40.
Cf. Ibn !(haldfin, Muqaddima, p. 26o, S from below.
/I Ci. Schreiner ZDMG., XLII pp. 630ft
'Taqrlb, fo1. 300 [naw I, trans1. lA, XVI (1900), pp, 493-4J.
8 Abu'l.Mal),asin, II, p. 23,4, 6from below. [For al.Dar-imi d. GALSI, p. 270.]
[259]
238 VOLUME TWO: CHAPTER 8
tended sense of Musnad discussed above, p. 2I3. This is a book
that by its plan and tendency belongs completely to the series of
those Sunan works which we discussed before (p. 229), the only
difference being that al-Darimi, who was also concerned primarily
with promoting legal knowledge in accord with the views of the
Ashab al-Hadith, endeavoured to foster this tendency by premising
a chapters on traditions and the science of traditions
in which he adduces arguments for the defence of his views.' In
accepting l)adiths al-Darimi also did not keep to the strictest 'condi-
tions' which guided his contemporaries, the authors of the Sabiizs,
but like the authors of other S,ma" works he added a criticismof the
degree of their credibility.' In the subjective use which he makes of
the hadiths he recalls al-Bukhari, as also because he often appears in
the of guide for the practical use to be made of the l)adiths.'
The glosses to the various traditions frequently contain the remark
that the lawexpressed there is not obligatory but merely facnltative;'
in this case he usually says huwa aZ-arlab or Zaysa bi-wajib or words
to this effect.
5
Such remarks he probably made orally to his hearers
when he taught them his book. This is borne out by the often
repeated gloss in al-Darimi's Sunan: AbU Mul)ammad or 'Abd
Allah. (i.e. the author) was asked: 'Do you observe (in legal practice)
this l)adith (taqUZ bihi or ta'khudh bihi)?' To this he occasionally
answers in the affirmative' but often also in the negative' or evasi-
vely: e.g. qawm yaquZuna, 'there are people who observe it,'" In the
same manner he points out for single l)adiths the differences con-
cerning them between Ahl al- 'Iraq and Ahl al-I;Iijaz or other groups.-
Like other authors of Sunan he quotes the contrasting l)adiths
lO
and makes his own decision--{)ften quite independently and in
contradiction of recognized authorities-for or against them:
'AbU Mul)ammad (the author) says: "Al)mad b. I;Ianbal has declared
the l)adith of 'Amr b. Murra correct, but I decide for the l)adith
of Yazld b. Ziyad/
l/ll
1 Ed. Co:wnpore pp. r-87.
2; AI-DarimI, p. 60, Jarir'an'.A$im: I do not think that J. heard this from
tA.; p. 91: 'Abd aI.Karim is similar to matrttk; p. 359: 'Uthman b. Sa'd is
gal'lj. Often he himself points out that informants of the chain \vere not
in communication, pp. 315, 331, 358. He drav,ls attention to differences in the
isniid and sometimes corrects its errors or discusses its uncertainties, pp. 26r,
,65,32 6,338,432 .
S Ibid. p. 90:fa-·dallafi'lrasiU Alliih etc., cf. pp. 253. 255, 262, 266.
4 pp. 7off.
Al.Darimi, pp. 90, 91, 284.
II Ibid., pp. 114. 196, 197, 230, 250, 254. 351, ja'awma'a bi-ra'siM, p. 349.
1 Ibid., p. II, 98, 116, 156.
S Ibid., pp. 342, or he said Iii. adri, p. 10!.
, Ibid., pp. lIB, 244.
10 Ibid., Esp. p. In gives an example of this. 11 Ibid., pp. 152.
\
.
l ....
:1
'.
j
THE <J:ADITH LITERATURE 239
It wonld be very difficnlt and also useless for our purpose to try
to understand today the taste of oriental theologians in order to
find out why the Sunan aZ-Darrmi did not find the same esteem as
the other four Sunan works. It is likely that part of the explanation [260J
for this neglect is to be sought in the fact that, owing to hesitant
attitude of the author towards his material-as we have seen from
the points illustrated for this purpose-the work was more suited to
become a source for the opinions of his time than an authoritative
codex traditionum. A further factor is that the codex of al-Darimi
is less exhaustive and offers little of the minute details which Abu
Diiwiid and al-Nasii'i supply. Although its bnlk is hardly a full third
of that of other Sunan works, this codex deals also with the non-
legal chapters of the l)adith'--that is why it is occasionally called
Jami' (see above, p. 2I3)'-and from this the limited size ofthe part
concerned with the large field of law can be deduced. Thus the
limitation of the material, as well as the plan of the book, are likely
to have contributed to the fact that al-Darimi's book was, in contrast
to the works of his younger contemporaries, neglected and not put
by the ijma' of the islamic world on the same level as those author-
ities.
At least the S"nan aZ-Dayimr were not forgotten; they were
and much cited, and even in modern times it was felt necessary to
publish an edition of these Sunan. At the period of the mU$annafat,
however, there appeared books which were completely ousted by the
infl.uence that the 'six books' obtained in the Islamic world, and
which were totally forgotten and not taken account of, even in
leamed circles, unlike al-Darimi's. To mention but one example: at
that time a traditionist of Christian descent' trained in oriental
Islam named Baqi b. Makhlad al-Qurtubi (d. 276) in al-AndaluS
composed a mU$annaf of a particnlar type. His work is at the same
time a as well as a musnad, or rather an attempt at a
transition from the latter to the former. Isnad authorities are, as
with Al)mad b. I;Ianbal, the starting point (he mentions no less than
I3
00
Companions)' but the traditions of each of these authorities are
arranged according to the chapters of the law.
5
It is not surprising
that such a collection was superseded by the more practical 'six [261J
books', even in its homeland. Another reason for its lack of success
was possibly that Baqi had no good reputation with his
owing to his independent attitude in the theological issues of his
I Ibid., e.g. the introductory chapter. further pp. 27zff" 3
6
3,ff., n_
I Thus the title of the Leiden Ms. of is: K. al·Musnad
Cat. Lugd. Batav., IV, p. 49.
• Cf. D02Y, ZDMG, XX, p. 598.
, From Aba Hurayra he has 5374 traditions, al·Nawawi, I, p. 37.
Ibn BashkuwaJ., no. 227, p. 516.
24
0
VOLUME TWO: CHAPTER 8
times; like every independent thinker he suffered a great deal from
the theological clique.' It seems that for a short time his work
was studied: Ibn Akhi Rafi' (d. 318) wrote a compendium of it'
and, probably following this example, AbU' l-'Abbas al-Nisabfui
(d. 313), Abii IsQj.q al-Iefahani (d. 353) and al-'AssaI (d. 349)
compiled ",usnad collections which were arranged according to the
contents.
3
Of all the literary products of the third century belonging to this
group, only the 'six books' achieved canonical recognition. These
books are used as reference in order to find out the traditional
teaching about a given question. If in the field of tradition one
speaks of and one has the two ;iaMbs and
those Sunan works and respectively, their authors in mind. Al-
NawaWi writes for example in connection with the decision about a
ritual question: huwa fi "'adhhab al-Shiifi'i bi-'ttifaq al-
i.e. 'this is right according to the school teaching of al-
Shaff'i in agreement with the authors'-after having referred to al-
Bukhari, Abu Dawiid and al-Tirmidhi. <
We cannot establish with chronological accuracy the date which
brought the concensus publicus for the two ;iaMbs to maturity or the
date when the favour of the ij"'ii' was extended to the-'Six books'.
Nevertheless we think that for answering the second question there
are two data, a positive and a negative one, which may be used as
chronological starting points: Firstly, that the general recognition of
the 'six books' had not yet prevailed in the first half of the fourth
century. This is evident from the fact that Sa',d ibn al-Sakan (d. in
Egypt 353). who was of great theological renown (he was called
al-bujja, 'the proof'), when asked to point out the most important
[262] things in the accumulated mass of religious literature, brought four
bundles from his house saying 'these are the foundations of Islam:
the book of al-BukhaJi, that of Muslim, of AbU Dawiid and Nasa:'."
Thus there was a tendency even at that time to extend the circle of
canonical collections of traditions beyond the two ;iaMbs, but it
did not yet include all the 'six books'. Secondly, that at the end of
the fifth or beginning of the sixth century al-Tirmidh, and Ibn
Maja were already included in this group. Ibn I;Iazm (d. 456) still
had some doubts about al-Tirmidhi. Doubts were maintained longest
about Ibn Maja because of the many weak (tja'if) traditions which
he incorporated into his corpus traditionu",. About that time the
1 E, II, pp. II2 f. [eL also GAL S I. p. 27I.]
2 Tab. l;Tuff., XII, no. I I. ..
3 §annaja al·musnad 'ala'l-tariijim, ibid., no. 25: al-musnad 'alii'l-abwiib,lbld.,
no. 4; I:I. Rh., V. p. 534, no. tI997·
4 Manthurat, fo1. Sa.
G Tab. I;luff., XII, no. 38.
=
THE 1;IADITH LITERATURE .241
first attempts are made to award recognition for these two collec-
tions, which up to then had not been considered as fully valid. Such
attempts were made, however, in isolation and there are signs that
doubts about Ibn Maja remained alive for yet another century.
The Spanish scholar Razin b. Mu'awiya from Saragossa who lived in
Mecca (d. 535) wrote a compendium of the six §aMb books' but Ibn
Maja was not used as a source for his work; the author used the
Muwa!!a', in addition to the five books. Also Muhanlffiad 'Abd al-
I;Iaqq al-Azdi, called Ibn al-Kharrat, from Seville (d. 581) allotted no
place to Ibn Maja among the sources of his compilation al-Abkiim
al-Kubrii, which he based on the recognized canonical collections.'
Mu!).anlffiad b. Ab, 'Uthman al-I;Iiizim' from Hamadan (d. 584)
only knows al-a'i",ma al-khamsa.
3
The attempt to gain a place
amongst the canonical authorities for Ibn Maja had already been
made at that time; it was instigated by Abii'l-Fa<;ll Mu!).ammad b.
Tahir al-Maqdisi (d. 507)< but met with only partial success. Whereas
the summarizing works of that time which we have just mentioned
do not yet consider Ibn Maja, and the strict 'IraqI scholar Ibn-al-
Jawzi (d. 597) does not, even much later in his Musnad Collutor
(jii",i' al-Masiinia),' take into account suggestions since made for
the recognition of certain traditions, we learn from al-BaghaWi
(d. 5I6) that he did take notice of Ibn Maja among the sources of his
famous compilation al-Sunna, also called al-
Dujii,· and even included among his authorities al-Da.rirni. A further
attempt to give a firm position to Ibn Maja in canonical literature
was made some decades later by 'Abd al-Ghani al-Janlffia'ill (d.
600)7 in his work al-Ik"'iil, or more correctly al-Kamiil fi Ma'rifat
al-Rijiil,· where the authorities of the 'six books' are considered.
This renewed attempt at making the Sunan of Ibn Maja equal to the
canonical writings appears to have met with greater success than the
preceding ones. This is shown by the fact that subsequently the
'six books' are generally given consideration in literature. Ibn al-
Najjar (d. 643) subsumes the rijiil al-kutub al-sitta under a uniform
1 J:I. Kh., II, p. 129; III, p. 132, tajrfcl al·.sitta. The book of Razin
is much used by the author of the Madkhal.
Z Cat. ar. Br. Mus., p. 712b, no. 1574: cf. al-Kutubi, Fawiit al.Wafayiit. I,
P·248.
is In Ahlwardt. Bed. Cat. II, p. 40, no. II4I, 13.
.. Tab. J:luff., XV, DO. 21 mentions a .{:ahirite; ct. ,ldhiriten, p. rIS, 4.
For the incorporation of Ibn Maja: preface to aI.Darim!, p. 7 (after Ibn l:Iajar),
1:1. Kh., V, p. 175, I, Ahlwardt, op. cit., p. 95. no. 1254; for Abfl'l-FaQ.! d.
also Yaqftt, IV, p. 602, top. -
Ii He speaks this himself in his book K. al-Qu$$ii$ wa'Z.1I-fudhakkirzn. -:fol.
179; d. Cat. of the Leiden Library, IV, p. 320, I .
• Loth. Cat. Ind. Off., p. 35. no. 49.
1 Al.Bajama'wi, Ajla MasanJa, p. 30, 3:ff.; about this work see above, p. 180.
S Yaqut, II, p. II3, 17. -
[263]
242 VOLUME TWO: CHAPTER 8
category.' Ibn Taymiyya (d. 652) bases his al-Muntaqiifi'I-A/:tkiim
2
on the 'six books', including Ibn Milja,' Najib al-Din ibn al-$ayqal
(d. 672) collects the l;adiths of those rijiil who are quoted as authori-
ties by the 'six imiims'.' Likewise Shams al-Din al-Jazarr (d. 7II)
is a summarizing work of his acknowledges Ibn Milja as an un-
disputedauthority together with the authors of the other five books.·
Yiisuf al-:M.izzr (d. 742) also treats the atriif al-kutub al-sitta together. 6
We may therefore conclude that the bracketing together of the 'six
books', as it is stilI recognized in Islam today, penetrated the
collective consciousness of Muslim theologians in the seventh
century.
Despite the fact that from now on these works were considered as
the most important sources for religious teaching, public opinion
[264] stilI put the two $a/:ti/:ts on a higher plane than the other four books.
The two always eclipse the others, as is evidenced by the literary
habit of speaking, al-Bukhari and Muslim apart, of the 'four' (al-
arba'a) as a special group.' The two remain al-Shaykhiin par ex-
cellence,· to whom a special position is allotted amongst the al-
a'imma al-sitta" with whom they are bracketed together for practical
purposes.
Though the recognition of the 'six books' as a canon took place in
the cOurse of the seventh century, in a large part of the Islamic world
it would nevertheless be wrong to say their canonical importance, as
it exists later and up to the present day, was generally admitted from
the beginning. It must be taken into account that the endeavours
which originated in Syria only gradually reached the whole of the
Muslim theological world and that these endeavours at first had their
basis merely in the individual judgements of particular scholars.
There always remained independent minds who did not allow them-
selves to be influenced by the lumping together of the 'six books'
but who further nourished the scruples against Ibn Milja which
had existed earlier, and did not wish to accept equal recognition of
this book and the other Sunan works. This explains the fact that in
the seventh century AbU 'Amr 'Uthmiin ibn al-$aliiJ:> (d. 643), the
11;1. Kh., I, p. 290, I.
II Cat. ar. By, A/us" p. 540b, no. IIg2.
:I This work has another title: al-M.fi 'l-Akhoar, this is the title in the printed
edition, Bl1Iaq, in seven vols., Annual report D1
1
4.G, 1879, p. 148, no. 75.
, Ahhvardt, Berl. Cat. II, p. 258, no. 1577.
• 1;1. Rh., V, p. '75.
II Ahlwardt, l.e., p. 175, no. 1375.
7 Tab. l;luff., VIII, nos. 76,92, 100; IX, no. 56; al·BukharZ wa'l·arba'a or
Muslim wa'l-arba'a, ibid., nos. 2, 14,53. al.E:utubi, I, p. 209, penult. If in Tab.
I:iuff.. VIII, no. r03, IX, no. II al·a'immat al·khamsa is spoken of, this means
al.Bukhiiri: plus al·arba'a.
S Ibid., VIII, no. 6r.
• Ibid., nos. 77, 90, 95, 96, 99, 104, 105, 114, 1I9·
I
THE <IADITH LITERATURE 243
author of the isagogical work' Uiilm al-Jfadith,l speaks of five basic
works, excluding Ibn Milja,' and that a]-Nawawr after him (d. 67
6
), --
who edited the work of Ibn al-$aliiJ:>, just mentioned, and used it
copiously also in his other works, only recognizes 'five books' (01-
kutub al-khamsa) and expressly places the Sunan of Ibn Milja on the
same plane as the Musnad of Ibn Ranbal.· Even later authorities
who wished to keep to the number six, substituted Malik's Muwatta:
or al-Diirimr's M usnad for Ibn Milja.' As late as the eighth cent';;", [265)
at the time of the writing of the Mishkiit by SheikhWill
al-Din AbU 'Abd Allah (d, 737), this uncertainty about the 'sixth of
the six books' is stated, but the author of this compilation decided
in favour oflbn Milja,' whereas Ibn Khaldiin (d. 808) only speaks of
al-ummahiit al-khams, i.e. the five basic works, without even men-
tioning Ibn Milja by name.
6
The attempt to showreverence to Miilik
and his work by adding it as a seventh to the canonical 'six books'
and reference to al-kutub al-sab'a al-/:tadithiyya, seem of a more
recent date. '
XIV
It cannot be overlooked that the canonical bracketing together of
the 'six books' was the work of eastern Islam. In the Maghrib, at the
time when this view took hold in the East, an even more extensive
recognition of the tradition literature which had greatly grown in the
meantime-see next section-established itself, Rere, towards the
end of the sixth century, there is talk of al- 'ashara,
the ten works, as of one closed canon. These are the ten
works which, according to the account of the contemporary 'Abd al-
Will;id al-Marrilkushr, the third Ahnohad prince, AbU Yusuf
Ya'qub, made the basis of a compilation which he appointed as the
law book of his empire after eliminating all derived fiqh works
(Juril').' Apart from the five books it contains: (6) the Muwatta',
(7) the Sunan of al-Bazzilr (d, 440), (8) the Musnad of Ibn Abl
Shayba (d. 264), (9) the Sunan of al-Dilraqutnr (d. 385) and finally
1 See above, p. 175.
• Taqrlb, fo!. 35' (now. I, trans!. lA, XVI (I900), p. 485], I;I. Kh.' V, p.
I74u1t.
:s: Introduction to Muslim, I, pp. 5, 70; ct. Fleischer Leip. Cat., p. 4
8
5
b
,
bottom; Loth's Cat. Ind. Off., p. 86a, top. - --
" In Salisbury, p. 137, Risch, p. 38, top. --
& Harrington, 'Remarks upon the authorities of Musulman Law,' Asiatic
Researches, X, (Calcutta, 1808), p. 477, note.
e Muqadclima, p. 370, 8.
1 'AM al..Ghani al·Nabulusi, ZDMG,S;XVI, p. 666, no. 58 (cr. ibid, no. 5
0
-:
al-kutub al-sltta wa-Muwa/ta' Malik). The modern Muslim 'Writer al-Bajama'wi
also groups together al,u$Ul al·sab'a in this sense, Masanid, p. 14. -
8 History oj the Almohades, ed. Dozy, 2nd ed., p. 202.
xv
The apogee of Islamic literature was of very short duration. Its
fresh immediacy decayed as quickly as it had developed in all its
branches !rom its into astonishing richness, giving way to
dry and hfeless compilatlon. A few great writers who stand out as
exceptions show up the general level of intellectual production even
more. In the fifth century of Islam, the literature, especially in the
religious field-al-Ghaz1ili is the last author with independent ideas-
shows !e:" original concepts or independent attitudes; compilation
and wntmg of commentaries and glosses is in full swing. Several old
books are worked into a new one or a large work is epitomized
(mukhta:;ar); this characterizes with but few exceptions the literary
activity of the subsequent era.
':'hen an Arab critic points to the tenth century as the periodm
whIch there are hardly any more authors but merely copyists'
he is too lenient towards the preceding five hundred years. 1\1-
Muqaddasi (fourth century) was already able to say that some of his
predecessors were but compilators and to consider himself as a
excepti?n to. the ge?eral trend of literary work by men-
tlonmg as a particularIty of his book that offered only new, hitherto
unheard ?f, material.' Compilation increases gradually, passing
through different stages up to al-Suyiiti (d. gIr), who represents the
peak of the later Islamic literature,' and this development shows a
steadily decreasing original productivity and an increase in the most
superficial.kf;!d of book making.which can hardly be distinguished
from plag;ansm. Even a relatively early writer, (fifth
century), IS a real literary magpie and confesses to the principle:
'In compiling my book I claim no more glory than that of the best
selection, since selecting is part of one's intelligence." In the tenth
cent."fY: a writer characterizes the literary circumstances
of his tnne WIth the words: 'Authorship nowadays is but collecting
what is scattered and glueing together what has crumbled.'- In the
course of this literary decay it came to this, that even the loose
stringing of without any gniding principle-as
for example m the K"U,yytit of Abu'l-Baqa: or the Safinat al-Raghib
, 'Umar b. Maymtm al-Magbribi, ZDMG, XXVIII, p. 318.
t AI-Muqaddasi, ed. de Goeje, p. 241.
s (in Ta,b. al:Mujassir!n, p. 22, 10) has correctly
charactenzed the plagIarIsm of thlS wnter, for whose compilations we must
nevertheless. b: grateful since they preserved many remains of lost and rare
books. Yet It IS al-Suyilti who wrote a maqama on 'the difference between-
and plagiarist' (Cat. ar. Lugd. Batav.. I, p. 237. In the lithographed
edition of maqiimas 5.1., 1275) this is not included.
• Zakr al-Adiib, I, p. 4. .
• Ibn ?uhayra, Cran. Mekk., II, p. 328, penult.
244 VOLUME TWO: CHAPTER 8
(ro) the Sunan of al-Bayhaqi (d. 458). The Sunan of Ibn Maja is not
included. That, in the Maghrib, the canonical sanctioning of the
'ten books' was generally accepted in Abu Yusuf's time is seen from
the fact that the Alldalusian scholar AbU'l-'Abbas AJ;unad ibn
Ma'add
'
al-Tujibi from Iqlish (d. about 550) based his work on the
[266] 'famous collections, i.e. the ten books'; but instead of al-Bayhaqi
he used the work of 'Ali b. 'Abd al- 'Aziz al-Baghawi.' But in the
Mashriq also they did not stop at the canon of six books after the
seventh century. The 'six books' were generally recognized as the
chief works of l!adith but with the reverence paid to the 'Ulama'
al-umma it would have been considered as an injustice not to award
part of the honour accorded to the of the third century
to the old m"snads which until now had not had a fair share of it.
Whereas, in the Maghrib, the canonization of the ten books was due
to an endeavour to find the best sources for practical law, in the
East it was merely the result of the effort to rehabilitate, at least in a
literary sense, the venerated authorities of the past whose works were
not considered within the sitta, also for practical reasons. Therefore
this canon of ten books did not gain established authority in the East
as it did under official sponsorship in the West. The selection of the
ten works is also not unalterably fixed but left to subjective inclina-
tions. Here they are not met with before the eighth century. At that
time the traditionist Shams al-Din al-I:Iusayni from Damascus
(d. 765) wrote a book entitled al-Tadkhira fi Rijiil al-'Ashara, in
which all the informants occurring in the isnads of the 'ten books'
were to be dealt with in the same way as earlier literature on tradi-
tions had occupied itself with the treatment of the rijal of the two
$a(li(ls, and later with the rijal al-k"t"b al-sitta.' The ten books here
are chosen quite arbitrarily and comprise in addition to the six
books: (7) the M"wa!!a', (8) al-Musnad (perhaps that of A1)mad b.
I:Ianbal?), (g) the Musnad of al-Shafi'i, (ro) that of AbU I:Ianifa.'
The well-known Ibn I:Iajar al-'Asqalani also summarized 'ten books'
in one of his works, 'A!raf al-K"t"b al-'Ashara wa'l-M"snad al-
Ifanbali." A!raf means the beginning and end of the isncltis, the
companion to whom the tradition is related back and the most
[2671 recent authority who transmits it. Since 'ten books and the Musnad
of Ibn Hanbal' are referred to here rather than eleven books, it must
be that the ten refers to a number of ];ladith works that in
some waybelong together.
1 In Yaqut, I. p. 339. 8, Ma'ruf.
II Cat. Lugd. Batav., 2nd ed., I, p. 2II=ISt ed., IV, p. 76; cr. also p. lor.
Ahlwardt, Ber!. Cat. II, p. 123. no. 1298.
I Tab. Ijuff., XXI, no. 9, al·Dhahabi.
4 Ibid., XXII, no. 8. The combination (of the six books?) is unintelligible;
ibid., XXIV. no. 10.
5 Ibid., no. 12.

THE LITERATURE
245
[268]
-
-------
[269]
VOLUME TWO: CHAPTER 8
(Biilaq, I253)-was called literature and the colIector was the more
highly praised the more volumes he filled with his colIectanea. The
col1ectanea of Baha' al-Din al-'Amili-which are so relished by
orientals'--are by similar works which were written
earlier. The Andalusian historian Abu'l-Hasan b. Sa'id, who is welI
known to readers of al-Maqqari, wrote the name of Marzama'
a colIection of belIetristic and historical notes, thevolume of which is
said to be a camel load. '
Oriental authors always accepted much latitude in respect of
literary ownership. An index of plagiarists would contain many
important names. This bad custombegan early in Islamic literatuie.·
We have shown elsewhere in detail how piratical was the behaviour
of, for example, al-Tha'alibi (d. 430).' In the seventh century 'Imad
aI-Din b. al-Athir simply copied the historical commentary of Ibn
Badriin and passed the work off as his own without even mentioning
the true author.' Without giving it much thought 'Vmar b. 01-
Mulaqqin plagiarized in the eighth century: a biographer reports
that the largest part of his three hundred works were thefts from
other authors.
7
That the famous o1-1faqrizi had few scruples in this
respect we learn, in regard to his great historical book, from the
biography of al-Sakhawi, who accuses him of having simply made
his own the work of his predecessor (al-Awl).adi),' and this accusation
appears more credible when it is known that the same al-Maqrl2i
coped Ibn l:Iazm literally without even once mentioning him.'
The science of tradition also was past its prime with its first
classics. With the closing of that literature which we have just
described as the canonical one, boundiess compilation began to gain
ground. It is true that !)adlth literature in its very nature could be
little else but the fruit of colIection and compilation. But it has been
evident from what has gone before that the independence of the
classical colIectors is seen in their folIowing their own principles
1 Literaturgesch. dey SM'(J p. '1.7.
S Bundel. Collectors loved such titles for their works. Baha.' aI.Din calls
one of his works 'nosebag' (mikhliit).
a Al.Maqqarl, I, p. 640. A collection of fabulous extent is mentioned by
Tashkoprii.:zade in his history of Ottoman scholars, al-Skaqa'iq al-Nu'maniyya
(Ms. Kaiser. Hofbibliothek, Vienna, H.G.. no. 122), I. fol. rosa. The author is
Mawlana Mu'ayya d-zade, beginning of the tenth century.
4. Al-Mas'ftdi accuses Ibn Qutayba of stealing the contents of the work al·
Akhbiir at.'['iwal (ed. Guirgass) and claiming it as his own, H. Rh., II, p. 105.
l:i Geschichte der SprachgeZehYsamkeit. III, pp. 29ft:.
IS Dozy. Commentaire historique sur Ie poeme d'Ibn Abdoun, introduction, p.
31.
7 Al.Sakhawi (Ms. Kaiser. Hofbibliothek, Vienna, Mixt. no. 133), fo1. 1I7a
[al-I)aw' al-Lami'. VI, p. 103].
8 Quatremere, Histoire des Sultans Mamlouks de l'Egypte, I, p. xii.
, dhiriten, p. 202.

---

THE 1;1ADITH LITERATURE 247
in collecting, and in their critical evaluation and practical
apphcatlOn of what they had colIected; this is increasingly so the
nearer we get to the beginning of this literature. Already the later
parts of the 'six books' show the decay of literary power, which from
the fifth century sank right down to the level of exercises in com-
pilation.'
It be stressed: however, that even the later literary rep-
resentahves of the sc'ence of tradition have in their compilations
certain purposes in mind and intended to serve the study of the
l,Jad!th by contributions. This purpose is achieved by
vanous means. Frrstly they aim at working canonical books to-
gether, either just the two $a(tibs (jam' bayn as, for
example, the two Andalusian theologians, al-l:Iumaydi from Majorca
(d. 488) and Ibn al-Kharrat from Seville (d. 582);2 or they extend
the work to the whole of the six canonical books, sometimes adding
one or other renowned work (Musnad Abmad or al-Diirimj). The
more the development of literature advances the more extensive
becomes the material used for these compilations. In the eighth
century, 'Ala' al-Din al-ShaykhI from Baghdad (d. 741) based his
,,":ork on compilation (called Maqbul al-Manqu!J, in addition to the
SIX books, also on the 1v[usnad of A!)mad, alrMuwa!!a' and al-Diira-
q
u
t
n
i,3 and in the ninth century al-Suyiitl extended the field even
furthcr in his compilation all existing collections from new points of
view in his Jam' al-Jawam".' By inventing new, even if incidental
of dividing the material this great compiler attempfed
to give hIS works the flavour of novelty. Abu Mul).ammad al-l:Iusayn
b. Mas'ud al-Baghawi (d. ca. 510) appeared earlier in the field with a
certau: critical in his M al-Sunna. He produced a
collectIOn complIed from seven basic works whose material he
classified according to fixed principles by quoting first in each
chapter the passages from the two $a(tib$ as i.e. as perfecfly
sound !)adiths, then giving a number of (lasan, i.e. 'beautiiul
he :alls taken from the Sunan works-and finaJry-
adding from tIme to hme quite uncertain traditions as ghar,b
1 The last original lJ,adith work to be adapted and studied later (though
not too often) was the $aMb of Ibn ,!:1ibban (died 354) which was known
because of its artificially detailed disposition under the name of al-Taqastm
a Ms. a later adaptation of this work with glosses by Ibn !.fl:J.j.a
r
IS In the Cat. ar, Bnt. Mus., p. 70gb. no. 1570, a fragment in Ahhvardt, BerI.
II, p. 106, no. 1263. In Asanid al-Mu!:taadithln one can find a descrip.
tlosn of arrangement of thIS l,1adith work. [See GAL I, 172, S I, 273.]
Cf. Ca.lro Cat. I, p. 214; Cat. ar. Br. Mus., no. 1563, p. 705 a.
3 Cairo Cat. I, p. 316.
4. I:!. Kh., II. p. 614: cf. for the two great collections of s. Uam'al-Jawamf'
and al-]ami' al-$agMr) , Ahlwardt, BerI. Cat. II, p. 155. no. 1351; p. 157,
no. 1353.
[270]
[273J
[271]
248 VOLUME TWO: CHAPTER 8
(strange) or even rja'if. He was preceded in this work of classification
by al-Tirmidhl who was the first to distinguish the 'beautiful'
I:;tadlths.' AI-Baghawl however lucidly arranged the
qualified sayings according to. their grades of and
therefore his work, thanks to Its completeness and prachcal use-
fulness, enjoyed great popularity among the Muslim people up to
quite recent times, especially in the adaption made by Wall
al-Tabrizi in the eighth century (MishMt al-Ma$abiJ;). For Mushms,
especially the half-learned, this book replaces all those older
tions from which it was compiled; it avoids all the inconvement
display of isnaas and, as the author admits in his preface, aims less
at scholarly pedantry than at edification: 'I have collected these
hadiths for those who dedicate themselves to the service of God, so
that this work may give them, together with the Book of God, some
portion in the sunan and may support them in their intention_of
leading a life pleasing to God.' Though legal of
is represented, a preponderance of the ethIcal and edifymg parts IS
evident.
A second motive obtaining among the later collectors is the
attempt to confine their compilations to a particular sphere of the
ahiidfth collected in the books of traditions, limited by its contents.
Hadiths are collected from the point of view ethical behaviour under
the title of al-Targhib wa'l-Tarhib, such as that by the Nisabiirian
theologian al-Bayhaqi (d. 458) or later that of Zaki al-Din al-Mundh-
irl (d. 656), who does not confine himself to moral sentences OI;ly.'
Other authors stressed legal traditions. The famous Ibn Taymlyya
(d. 652) selected the abiidith al-ahkam from the six books and the
Musnad A bmad' and he was preceded in this by the Andalusian
Ibn al-Kharrat al-Azdi (see above p. 24I) and his I,Ianbalite comrade
al-J ammO. 'ill. (p. 24I).·
The third motive was the entirely formal endeavour to sum-
marize the most important I:;tadiths in an easily accessible compen-
dium so that every saying could easily be found. This led, appar-
ently'from the fifth century onwards, to an arrang':n:e?t
of the sayings,' whether by the names of mformants or by mltIal
1 Abo\'e, p. 232. What is described as gharib in his model Bagh. included as
such, e.g. the tradition of the bird (above, p. 113), II, p. 200, 1.
! Ms. of the Br. Mus. Cat. ar. Br. .lJ,lus., p. 72oa; Ahlwardt, Berl. Cat. n.
p. 141, nos. 1328fI.; cf., the collection of al·Nawawi, ibid, p. 145, no. 1334.
! Cf. above, p. 242.
... Cairo Cat. I, pp. 249, 254, 261, 318; Ahlwardt. Ber!. Cat. II, p. I26, nos.
1304ff.
J; E.g. 'Varner no. 355, of the Leiden Library. Cat. IV. pp. 65-74; Ms. no.
1575. Cat. ar. By. Mus., p. 713a; Ahlwardt, Berl. Cat. II, p. 1II, no. 1278, p.
123. no. 1298. The works mentioned in Brill's Cat. period., nos. 345. 450 are
also of this kind.
-

THE J:lADiTH LITERATURE 249
words of each saying.' With this the various points of view from
which traditionists of later Muslim generations approached the
repeated elaboration of the vast I:;tadith material are by no means
exhausted. Some of these new collections were guided, as was true
also of .some .of the compilations previously mentioned, by the
general mtentlOn to extend the field of traditions and to vindicite
as .a religious source, sayings which were formerly rejected by
stncter ScllOOI as not trustworthy or as insufficiently authenticated.
To make extensions in this direction was most difficult in the legm
field; the greatest liberality was shown (following here older views)'
in paraenetic and legendary traditions. Here large numbers of
traditions were interpolated which at the time of the six books had
been rejected or in part had not even been in existence then. The
inclination to expunge manifest falsifications of earlier and later
times disappeared, and strict zealots suell as al-Khatib al-Baghdadi
(d. 463) and Ibn al-Jaw2l (d. 597) the most zealous persecutor of
forgeries, who wrote a large number of books on mawdu' at and
mudallisfn, preached to the deaf. A whole series of refutations' were
intended to weaken the castigations of the intolerant Ibn al-J awzi,
and the public was eager for the rescue of all kind of condemned
I:;tadiths, which were to be restored to an honourable position.
The attitude of pious Muslims of this period towards the rejection
of traditions is evident from various sigus. 'Abd al-Ral:;tman b.
Idris al-Razi (d. 327) wrote in the fourth century his work al-Jarh
wa'l-Ta'dil, which was concerned with the evaluation of criticai
objections to suspect authorities of traditions and suspect sayings.
This work exists in the Cairo Library in six volumes and in a few
incomplete copies.· Once a pious companion entered the lecture
room of the author while he was busy reading out his work. 'What
are you reading?' asked the guest, Yiisuf b. al-I,Iusayn al-Razl, of the
lecturer. He answered: 'It is entitled: al-]arb wa'l-Ta'dil. 'And what
does this title mean?' 'I exallline,' replied the author, 'the circum-
stances of sellolars, which of them' can be considered as trustworthy
and which not.' Then Yiisuf replied: 'Axe you not ashamed before
Allah to slander people who were received into Paradise some
hundred or two hundred years ago?' 'Abd al-Ral:;tman wept and said:
'0, Abii Ya'qiib, if this speech had reached my ears before I began
writing this work, verily I would never have written it.' The book
fell from his hands and he was in suell a state of excitement that he
could not continue the lecture.
5
These were the feelings of even
1 AI·Suyliti also followed alphabetical order.
t see above. pp. 145ff.
S Cf. Ij. Kh.. VI, p. 264 for the refutations of Ibn al-]awzI's criticism.
• Cairo Cat. I, p. 124 [GAL S I, pp. 278--g, Hyderabad I94
IfI
.]
Ii Abo.'l-Mal;lasin, II, p. 286.
[272]
VOLUME TWO: CHAPTER 8
[274]
2S0
critical minds when reverence for the tradition overcame them.
report is an actual illustration for the statement by al-Trrnudh,
that there were people who condemned the critical evaluation of the
trustworthiness of the rijiil,l
From such motives later traditionists re-established what former
stricter research had thrown out from the material of tradition. This
tendency was at work soon after the general dissemination of the
Al-I:Iakim from NisaMr (d. 40S),-;-'the great bafi:;, the
imam of transmitters' as al-Dhahabi calls him-wrote a M"stadrak
'alii in which he defended several traditions against the
two Sahihs and, more especially, endeavoured to prove that the two
sheikh; unjustly suppressed many traditions which by their own
sh"rut ought to have been regarded as fully valid. He fortmed
himself with Zamzam water in order to be strengthened by the
blessing of this holy drink in his pious intention." What kind of
traditions he defended against unjust condemnation can be seen
from the following examples. There we find silly fables of the
meeting of the prophet Ilyas (who is as three
dhirci' high) with Muhammed and hIS companlOn Anas b. Mahk.
The Old TestOlnent man of God embraces the Prophet of IslaJIl, con-
verses with him and they share a meal at a table which descends
from heaven. After this meeting Elijah vanished into the sky upon a
cloud. AI-Hakim adds to this account that this is i.e. bears
the mark ';f undeniable truth. It is to the credit of the independence
of mind of Muslim scholars that the spreading of this legend, which
has for it an authority like that of al-I:Iakim from Nisabur,
energetically rejected by ShaJIls al-Din a,J-Dhahabi (d. 748). This
Dhahabi followed in the eighth century m the footsteps of those
who in former times exposed the !flt'ajii', i.e. unreliable transmitters.
Amongst others he wrote a book entitled al-Miziin ji'l-f,,'ajii';"
In this book he dOl'es to make the following remark agamst this
fable: 'Was not al-I:Iakim afraid of Allah in giving to such an
account the seal of truth?' The SaJIle scholar also wrote a compen-
dium of the M"sladrak with refuting glosses. Here he adds the follow-
1 AI- Tirmidhi, II, p. 332. ....
2 Tab. l:!Hfj" XIII, no. 32 we often encounter In bIographies :he ?ehef
in efflcacy for scholarly undertakings of Zarnzam water. AI· Khatib al·
Baghdadi, who has so been often mentioned in this study, of .the sacred
\vater with the intention of participating in the blessing of bemg bUrIed next
the holy Bishr al·I:!afi, and further that his historical work mi.ght be read In
the mosque at Baghdad and that he himself might lecture m the
mosque. (Ibn al.Mulaqqin. Leiden Ms. Warner no, 532, fol. 36a): The well·
known pOlygraph Ibn I:1ajar drank the water in order to become as learned as
al·Dhallabi (Tab, Huff., XXIV, no. 12), Abft Bakr ibn al- < Arabi gives a charac.
tcristic about the efficacy of the Zamzam drink, al-MaqqarJ, I. p. 487.
Ink with Zamzam water: Ibn Bashkuwal, p, 501, no. I II.
sTab. I;Iuff., XXI, no. 9.
=
-
THE I;fADITH LITERATURE 2SI
ing words to the passage in question: 'Verily, this is invented; may
God make ugly the man who made this lie; I never dreaJIlt and
would not have believed it possible that al-I:Iakim was ignorant to
such a degree as to believe such things to be true:' Among the
traditions excluded by the which al-I:Iakim re-introduces is a
tradition about the Mahdi in which an exact description of this
saviour is given; the author of the Mustadrak thinks that the isniid
of this 1).adith entirely corresponds to the shart of Muslim. 2 Al-I:Iakim
also included the al-tayr (see above, p. Ir3) in his M usta-
drak-he seems to have had Shi'ite inclinations-and what orthodox
theologians thought of this is seen from this remark by al-Dhah,..Qi:
'I thought for a long time that al-I:Iakim would not dare to include
in his Mustadrak the "bird tradition", but when I studied this book
I was really frightened by the many apocryphal traditions aJIlassed
in this book:" Another specimen of al-I:Iakim's attempts at rescue is
the fact that he claimed that the 1).adith praising the 'scholar of
Medina' (Malik b. Anas)4 was entirely in agreement with the shltrut
of Muslim, on account of which he considered it as one of the sahih
traditions..Ii • • •
1, Both passages in al·Damiri (s.v. al-ltue). I, p. 336, top.
S In Ibn Khaldftn, Muqaddima, p.
26
3, 10.
:lAI·DamirI (s.v. al.nultam), II, p. 400.
.. See above, p. 142.
Al·Damiri (s.v. at.Ma!iya). II, p. 382.
VENERATION OF SAINTS [275] .
IN ISLAM
VENERATION OF SAINTS [277]
IN ISLAM
l
I
LIKE any other religious system that sprang from a processuof
historical evolution and was subject to many contacts, Islam too
at the time of its maturity is no longer a pure product of the inner
development of its own original concept. It is rather the result of
several factors, the chief two of which are: the development of its
own particular basic ideas, and the in:fIuence of old existing ideas
which were outwardly conquered and pushed aside but in fact were
unconsciously transformed by it and assimilated to its own essence.
During this evolutionary process Islam was also forced, by the
influence of the inherited instincts of the believers, to leave in many
respects the line which was traced at the beginning for its belief and
its practice. In no other field has the original doctrine of Islam sub-
ordinated itself in such a degree to the needs of its confessors, who
were Arabs only in a small minority, as in the field which is the sub-
ject of the present study: the veneration of saints.
In ancient Islam an insurmountable barrier divides an infinite and
unapproachable Godhead from weak and finite humanity. The
helpless creature looks longingly to the limitless heights, to the
realm of infinity and fate which is unattainable to it. No human
perfection can participate in the realm of infinite perfection, no
supernatural gift of a privileged individual can mediate between the
two spheres, which are linked only by the relations of causality and
dependence. No creature has part, even in a finite and qualified
l[The following short list contains works on the Islamic cult of saints which
may provide further illustrations for the phenomena discussed by Goldziher:
R. Kriss and H. Kri! ioh Volkslflaube im Bereich des Islam. I: W<!ll·
!3h.Ytswesen und Heiligenvereltrung. Wiesbaden, 1960 (mainly Egypt and Syria);
l'. £anaan. Mohammedan Saints and $andz<ar£es in paZesti'N', T aDdan TQ2Z:
E, :gautle, 'Les Marabollt,' RRR Xt-XLI <Iooc); E. Montet. Le culte des
sgints musuhnws dans I' Aftigue du Nord C-reneva rooo: E. Dennenghem.
Le witt du saints dans l'Islam magkrebin Paris. 1954. and of the articles
listed in J. P PramoD lndex Tslamic
us
IQo6-T955 nos 2666-2751. Articles
published by Goldziher on the subject after the Mohammedanische Studien
are 'Aus dem muhammedanischen Heiligenkult in Agypten,' Globus 7I (1897),
pp. 233fl. and 'Nouvelles contributions a. l'hagiologie de l'Islam: RHR,
XLV ('902), pp. 208£1.]
,
..
256 VoLUME TWO
measure, in the might which pertains to God; there is no creature
which owing to its perfection deserves even a shadow of the venera-
tion due to God; there is no cult conceivable which is directed
[278] towards other objects than Allah, no call for help, no recourse in
misfortune is thinkable, except to Allah. Even the most perfect
human being, whom God chooses to teach all mankind, is as weak and
transient as other men, he is mortal and full of passion as they are.
He cannot influence the course of nature, he works no miracles and
knows no mysteries-since only God can do these things-and only
the word of God which emanates from his mouth is of unattainable
perfection. He himself is merely 'the first who confessed Islam'
(Sura 6:14), 'a beautiful example to all who put their trust in God,'
'a shining torch' for them (Sura 33:31, 45). He even rejects the title
'father of true believers:' he is God's envoy and the end of the
prophets (v. 40). He does not know what is hidden and himself pro-
claims this to those whom he wishes to gain for himself: 'If I knew
what is hidden I should acquire much good and nothing evil would
touch me' (Sura 7:188, d. 6:50). God does not reveal the secrets of
the future even to him, and he firmly denies such knowledge. He
says: 'They will ask you for what time the arrival of the hour (of
judgement) is fixed; tell them 'Knowledge of this is with God only'
... They ask you this as if you knew; tell them only God knows'
(Siira 7:185-186).' Only God has the right to the title of 'Knower of
the hidden and present' ('iilim al-ghayb wa'l-shahiida). When asked
to work miracles Muhammed has but one answer: 'Praise be to my
God! Am I anything but a man, an envoy?' (SUra 17=95, 96), a
description which occurs repeatedly in the Koran. The same con-
cept of Muhammed's office and of his relation to other men is also
expressed in the oldest documents of the Muslim community, the
old badith. It is often repeated that the founder of Islam does not
wish to be distinguished more than other prophets;' the kha$ii'i$
at-nab! in their older version· do not concern particular miraculous
powers of the Prophet but points in religious and social life in
respect of which certain limitations are waived for him, or they deal
with favours which God showed to him before all other men. There
[279] are ouly two points concerning his personal capacities: tltat in
contrast to other prophets he was not sent to only one nation but to
mankind as a whole, and that he alone could be intercessor with God
on behalf of his believers.' He is explicitly made to protest against
1 Perhaps here an influence of Matt. 24:36 is to assumed?
s B. To-15fr, nos. 91, 97. etc.
a B. no. 56, five ci. above p. 31. Later this field was ex-
tended and particularly the Shi'ites stressed it; cf. Querry Droit musulman;
recueil de lois concernant Iss Musulmans shyites 1871-Z). I, p. 64-4-.
• "\-Vith special reference to Snra 2:256,17:81.
VENERATION OF SAINTS IN ISLAM 257
his personal character being described in the same way as Christians
describe the person of Jesus.
'
'Do not praise me as Jesus, son of
is praised, but say "the servant of God and His envoy''';
th,s sentence is said to have been originally in the Koran but to have
been omitted later.' In many traditional utterances he is shown as
equally determined to reject claims to know secret things as inihe
Koran,· and in the same sense 'A'isba is made to say: 'There are
three things: who maintains them maintains a serious lie in respect
of God; he who thinks (za'ama, see above p. 58) that Multarnmed
has seen his God; ... he who tlrlnks that Muhammed kept anything
secret of what God revealed to him (see above p. II4) ... and he
who thinks that Muhammed knew what would happen the next day:'
Even in his capacity of judge, Muhammed is made to decline any
claim to deeper illumination or insight; he is as liable to subjective
errors in weighing the arguments of the parties, as any other human
judge.- There is a well-known manner in which he is made to reject
challenges to work miracles, alter the course of nature, revive dead
persons, by pointing out that all this was not his mission. 6
Islamic dogmatics thereby gained a welcome idea7 and did not
omit to elaborate it in its scholastic manner. It is thus enabled to
teach, in agreement with the most ancient manifestation of Muslim
prophetism, that the fact of election to the office of prophet is not
due to the perfection of the individual concerned, nor can such
perfections be acquired by spiritual endeavour; the prophet's
appointment is merely an arbitrary action of God which turns [280]
towards whomsoever God elects, even if such an individual shows
little personal preparedness for so exalted a calling.• The prophet is
no more perfect than any other man, but is human as everybody
else, and only God's arbitrary grace makes an unworthy person the
interpreter of His will. To let the prophet touch the borders of the
divine and supernatural would be shirk ('association')-a teclmical
term which in Islam embraces, at least in theory, a wide field.'
1 B. Mu!,tiirabun, no. 17 [=ed. Krehl, J:iudiid, no. 3I J.
I Is not included, however, in the usual list of such passages (d. N51de1>.e,
Gesch. des Qor.• pp. x7.rtf. [2nd ed., I, pp. 234f1. The tradition also occurs in
B. Anbiya, no. 48; Darimi, Riqaq, no. 68: A1}.mad b. l;IanbaJ, Musnad, I, pp.
23, 24. 47. 55: al-Tirmidhi, Shama'il at.Mu$!afa, II, p. q8. It is nowhere
stated, however, that it was part of the Koran; the fact that it sometimes
follows the ayat al.rajm-for which ci. Noldeke, I, pp. 248ff.-may have
caused the error.]
3 B. Tafslr, no. 83. to Sfira 5:101.
, Al-TirmidhI, II, p. r79.
I B. Al}kam, nos. 29. 29. c.f. Ma.'?a.Iim, no. r6.
t: Ibn Hisham, p. r89. 5.
7 Cf. al·GhazaIi, al-Munqidh min al-+Jalal, JA. 1877. I. p. 47.
8 AI-Mawaqif, ed. Soerensen. p. I70'
D Ct. ZDMG, XLI, p. 69. In the teachings of the every kind of super.
[281]
VOLUME TWO
People who nursed and assimilated in their heart the monotheistic
concept of Islam with all its consequences have extended this idea
to its limits. During the fifth century of the Hijra, when the venera-
tion of saints with all its excesses dominated the world of Islam,
there lived a Muslim mystic called Samniin and surnamed al-
MuJ:ribb, the loving one, i.e. he who is sunk in the love of Allah.
Samniin once officiated as mu'arihdhin and when he reached this
passage in his text: 'I confess that there is no god but Allah, I
confess that Muhammed is God's apostle'--{)f which combination
it was in fact said that here God 'joined his name with that of the
Prophet''--he said: '0 God, if not Thou Thyself hadst ordered
the recitation of these words I would not mention Thy name in one
breath with that of Muhammed'." Such expressions of the exclusive
monotheistic conscience also occur in circles which are far removed
from the pantheistic impulses of mysticism; in another place many
of these have been collected.'
It may be easily understood that Muhammed was led to deprecate
his own gifts by more than his lofty concept of God. This was for the
clever man an easy way to avoid the danger of risking his prestige
by unsuccessful attempts at miracles. With his typical lack of
consequence, which is here shown by his recognition of older stories
of prophets, he had at every turn to reconcile the miraculous gifts
of the old prophets with his own teaching, and occasionally he was
forced even to raise them to a much higher position than he claiined
for himself (particularly Jesus, 3:43 ff., 5:IOg-IIO).
After all this there is no need to explain in detail that within
Islam in its original form there was no room for the veneration of
saints as it so largely developed later. 'The Koran itself polemizes
directly against the veneration of saints in other confessions which
1 KM-tanat al·Adab, I, p. 109. 24 Hassan n. Thabit [not in the Diwan];
wa-rjamma'l.iliihu'sma'l-nabiyyi ilii'smihi/idha.. qala ft'l-khamsi'l.mu'adkdhinu
ashhadu.
s Al.Biqa.'i, fol. Isa.
a In the article 'Le monotheisme dans la vie religieuse des musulmans,'
RHR, XV! (1887), pp. 157ft. To examples mentioned there for avoiding the
word Allah in compound proper names may be added 'Abdan (='Abd Allah)
Abil'l-Mal;t.asin, II, p. 204. On the other hand the names irom the second
century, Li'llah and Bi'IHih (the names of the two daughters of the poet Abft'!.
•Atahiyya), deserve mentioning, Agk., III, p. 170,4.
stition, belief in omens, wearing of amulets, and use of magic formulae, is
called shirk: Abl1 Diiwild, II, pp. :roo, 103; cf. al.Tirmidhi; I, p. 304: II, p. 83,
al·Damiri (s.v. al·liq(;a), II, p. 374. Hypocrisy (riya') is also called shirk,
Takdhib. p. 504; in another passage it is called the 'little shirk' (al.sk. al·
'Iqd, II, p. 369, cf. Ibn Maja, p. 296, inna shirk.
Already Luqman is made to warn his son of shirk in his al·Tirmidhi,
II. p. 179.
-.;:;:
VENERATION OF SAINTS IN ISLAM 259
co,?,sider their a[lbar and ruhban as arbab, divine masters (Siira 9:3
I
).
Samtly men and women, who by their endeavour to renounce
wordly goods, to,live !or God's sake, and to give willingly their life
as martyrs f?r HIm,. nse above the masses, could still be recognized
from pornt of VIew, and are therefore objects of admiration and
emulatIon, the Koran itself mentions them and prefers them to all
They. have the first places in Paradise and supermundane
delights aWaIt them. But they are no mightier than others while
amongst the living, and after their death they cannot be efficacious
in God's stead or claim superhuman honours. They are nothing but
?ead people who obtain their reward from God 'because He delights
rn them and they in Him.' But they achieve blessedness only for
themselves through Allah's mercy; they have nothing to offer or to
grant to the survivors, and like everyone except God 'cannot be
useful or do harm.'
There is an gap between this concept held by early
Islam and the posItIon which the veneration and invocation of
occupies shortly after the spread of the new
religlOn. Wlthrn as well, the believers sought to create, through
the concept of samts, mediators between themselves and an omni-
potent Godhead in order to satisfy the need which was served by the
gods and ma:ters of their old traditions now defeated by Islam. [2821
Here to? Karl Hase says.of cult of saints in general:
that It satISfies mthin a monotheIStIc religIon a polytheistic need
to. fi}l the enormous gap between men and their god, and that it
ongmated on the soil ofthe old pantheon.'l
It became possible to ascribe to men supernatural attributes which
participated in the divine powers only after the complete trans-
the Islamic doctrine about prophecy. It would have
been unposslble for the idea of supernaturally gifted men to develop
alongside the figure of a prophet such as that presented by Muham-
med to his people. The prophet had after all to be above the crowd
of awliya', the head of which he was destined to become in the course
of the development of the cult of saints. In effect the attitude of
people who turned to Islam favoured the extension of the attributes
of supernatural powers and gifts to chosen men. Even the Arab
contemporaries of the Prophet, friends as much as foes showed
little understanding of an apostle of God who did not surpass
or?inary folk in supernatural power and secret knowledge. They
saId: 'What manner of apostle is this? He eats food, and walks the
streets. If OulY there were an angel with him with whom he would
be a of morals, or if he were given a (secret) treasure or
owned a (!Illraculous) garden with fruits of which he enjoyed the
benefit' (25:8I9). They will not believe him uuless he makes springs
1 HandbUt;h dey protestantischen Polemik. 1St ed., p. 326.
260 VOLUME TWO
gush forth from the earth or darkens the sky, owns a golden house,
is given a book from heaven in their presence. The Prophet counters:
'God forbid, am I other than human, an envoy?' People were hin-
dered from belief, after true guidance had come to them, b)' the
saying: 'Has God sent an ordinary human being as envoy?' (IT92-
96).
In the same way as his foes demanded from him supernatural
acts, the performance of miracles, and transcendental knowledge
(2 :II2, 6:I09, I24, 7:I98-88, IO:2I, I3:8. 27, 20:I33, 2I:5, 29:49
[283] etc.),l his friends credited him, despite his assiduous denial that he
possessed such gifts, with the knowledge of hidden things. 'I have
knowledge of today and yesterday, but I am blind to thc knowledge
of that which will happen tomorrow': this was easily believed of an
ordinary poet' but of the Prophet such limitation was unacceptable.
How should the Prophet not be equipped at least with the gifts of
which sages, fortune-tellers and kiihins' could boast among the pagan
Arabs of his times?< His ovm protestations were of little avail.
The Arabs who were devoted to his cause combined their acknow-
ledgement of him with a belief in his higher abilities. Such people
could not imagine as other than omniscient a man who pretended
to have been sent to them by God.
5
There are several contemporary
testimonials for this, of which the first two are likely to be authentic.
The pagan poet al-A'sha calls Muhammed, on the occasion of his
conversion to Islam, 'a prophet who sees what you (ordinary people)
do not see;" and another contemporary poet calls him flatly 'knower
of the secret things' (' alim al-ghayb).' The Prophet paid a visit to the
An$an woman Rubey' bint Mu'awwidh after her marriage; the
young woman was surrounded by girl singers who were singing a
dirge for their fathers fallen at Badr, and recited the following
words: 'Amongst us was a prophet who knew what would happen
tomorrow (in the future).' It is true that the Prophet firmly declined
this praise. •
1 According to the practice of Muhammed of attributing to the opponents
of the uld prophets the objections which the Qurayshites brought against
himself (d. Part I, p, 19). this argument is also put in the mouth of the oppon-
ents of 11oses, 9:1:29. Such passages are collected, though in a rather superficial
and unsatisfactory manner, in the polemical book by the Abbe F. Bougarde.
La clef du COllan (Paris, 185'2), pp. 26-40.
2 Zuhayr, Mu'all., v. 48, ed. Landberg p. 90. v. 3.
3 An Arab kiihin is mentioned as late as the beginning of the second century,
al-Tabar!, III, p. 21, 9.
, Wellhausen, Reste arab. Heide",.thums, pp. 13off.
Ii Cf. Part I, p. 13, note I.
tEd. Thorbecke (Morgenland. Forschungen, p. 254) v. 14. [Diwiin, ed.
Geyer, 17:14.]
7 HudhayI., 126:3.
8 B. J111agho.z!, no. 12, Nika!J,. no. 48.
VENERATION OF SAINTS IN ISLAM 26I
The beginnin!5s of. the often described change in the concept of the
Prophet, bywhich his figure was endowed with miraculous attributes
thus reach. back into earliest times of Islam. Already
porary believers saw ill Muhammed only the superhuman miracle
man, whose death surprised even 'Umar as something impossible.' [284]
He threatened everybody who believed in the death of the Prophet
with cruel punishments? And the 'Abd al-Qays Arabs in Ba.{lrayn
turn away. from Islam under the pretext that a man who is subject
to death alJ ot?er men have been a prophet.
3
Though
the supposIhon of Immortality had in the nature of things to be
dropped soon, < the belief in the supernatural gifts of the Prop-het
whl1e could take firm root. It is one of the most curious pheno-
mena m the development of Islam to observe the ease with which
orthodox also adapts itself to the needs of popular belief,
though this entails open contradiction to the unambiguous teachiIIg
of. the Ko.ran. The power of ijmii' here scored one of its biggest
trIumphs ill the whole system of Islam, insofar as the belief of the
people succeeded in penetrating into the canonical conception of the
Prophet and, so to speak, forcing it to make him into a fortune-
teller, worker of miracles, and magician.
5
Without hesitation he is
made to say that he had been given the key to alJ the treasures of
t1>:e earth,' and had need ?f it, t?O, in order to work the many
rmracles of feedmg, quenchmg thIrst and healing which were
incorporated into his biography in order to satisfy the ideas of tlte
belie,,:,ers.' The of biographers in the next generation
contrIbuted suffiCIently to making the miraculous picture of the
Prophet and more rich and alJ-embracing. As early as the third
century It was posSlble for the Andalusian theologian Ibn I:Iibban
(d. 3I2) to teach that the man, who never ceased to declare himself
to be 'flesh' like the flesh of other men and to be perfectly
with them, was not subject to hunger and that any reports to the [285]
1 FaifJi:il al·A$biib, no. 6.
:t AI·TabarI, I, pp. I8IS!.
3 Ibid., p. 1958, 15.
-4 Muhammed ascribed to 'Umayya b. Abi'I-$alt in his
WIth reason: yamu:u kama mata man qad ma¢a/yuraddu
zla ·llah'/. ban Z·nasam, he dIes as those dIed who have vanished, he will be
returned to God, the creator of souls', Kkizii1zat al.Adab, I, p. 122, 18 [Whence
F. Schultess, Umajja ibn Abi's-SaZt, Leipzig, 1911, 23:
1
3].
3 E.g., B. ]umu'a, no. 25; Buyu" no. 32.
II B. Maghiizf, no. 29.
7 Excursuses Annotations, II, I. Later, and especially polemical,
theology even strIves to prove, by comparing the respective miraculous
stories, that the miracles of Muhammed were 'more exalted and
tha:z told of Jesus, Disputatio de religione Mohammedanorum adversus
Chnsttanos. ed. van den Ham (Leiden. I890), pp. I23ff., particularly pp. u.s,
2; 127. I6.
[286]
262 VOLUME TWO
contrary must be rejected as falsifications.' It not, take long
before a thousand miracles of the Prophet could be listed.
II
Thus the gap between the divine and the was bridged. The
way was free to equip humans with.supernat.ural So now appear
the saints with claims to veneratlOn and.mvoca:lOn. Several pSJ:-
h I
'cal factors which we shall discuss m detail later on, contn-
coog!, .. 'th ilf
buted to foster the development of this alien element m . e so 0
I I d to make a necessity out of it. It succeeded m estab-
s am an . . 'th th
lishing itself firmly in popular religion and m WI. e
exclusive cult of God. Side by side with the teachmg-whIch re-
mained always valid and was never disputed-that only God may be
invoked and only in His name mayan oath be the people
invoke the saints' and swear by their names: <Puntam:al followers
of the sunna and sceptical people of _VIews preach
vainly against all this. The sheikh I;!asan al-I;!I]az! (d. Ir3I), a
popular poet who not quite two centuries ago related the, cunous
events of his time in popular poems, which. w.ere used by Abd .al-
Rahman al-Jabarti in his historical work, the popul.atJ?n
of Cairo who invoked all their saints when the Nile was late m Its
anxiously awaited rise. 5
In order to be accepted alongside the veneration of God the cult
of saints had to be attached to a word which even in :he Kor.an
described persons particularly favoured-though eqUIpped Wlth
supernatural power. Such a term c?uld.then be used m the "";tended
meaning with which in course of hme It became charged. ThIS wor.d
served the purpose of being the bearer of comp.lete.ly un-IsI",:,'.c
veneration of saints and the legends assocIated wIth It, also legJtJ-
1 IV, p. 128, h b r f
I Disput. relig. Mohammed., p. 242, 6. [For the development 0; t. e
in Muhammed's miracles cf. T. Andrae, Die Person Mukamme 5 e 1'e
una Glauben seiner Gemeinde, Upsala, I9
1
7·] . ti £ 'Abd al
• Cf Arabian Nights ed. Biilaq. 1279. II, p. 94. lDvoca on 0
Qadir GHani and SaYYida Nafisa in time of need, ibid., III, p. 320; five anonr·
. ts are mentioned through whose merit someone attempts to obtam
release from need: ya rabb bi'l.kkamsat al-askyiikh
'five sheikhs' are presumably identical with t?: panj pry ,the IndIan Mushms
(Garcin de Tassy, Memoire sur Ies particularztes de la relzgzon musulmane dans
l'lnde p. 16). . th' d' the
j, It'is well known that in different provmces of Isla_m the IS rna _e m _
name of the respective local saints: wa-[tayiit sJana YaQya, wa-Qayat siana
al·Badawl, etc. . d l' b (C' 888)
"Merveilles biograph.iques et historiques . .. tradu.lts e ara e auo, I'b'd '
I, p. 71 [Arabic text, Cairo 1297, I, p, 30J; the bIOgraphy of the poet 1 1 "
pp. 181-195 [Arabic text I, pp, 75-83J·
:J
VENERATION OF SAINTS IN ISLAM 2
6
3
mized them in religious respect. We mean the word wali, plnr.
awliyii'. This word derived from a root which in the Semitic lan-
guages expresses the idea of adherence, attachment, and nearness,'
means firstly: he who is close, follower, friend, relative" and within
this group of concepts particularly that blood-relation who in
Arab custom has the duty of blood revenge for a member of the
tribe who has been murdered. (Sura 1T35, 27:50---d. 8:73-
1
9:23,
33:
6
)-the go'a. had-fUm or sMer (=Arabic IM'ir)' of the Bible,
or just heir in general. < In religious language this idea of nearness
was extended also to the 1elation of man to God. The Jews-
regarding whom Muslims (together with the Christians) are warned
not to take them as awliyii', 'since they are only awliyii' of each
other, but if one of you considers them as friends, he belongs to
them' '-are reproached for considering themselves as awliyii' of God
to the exclusion of all other men, i.e. as the chosen people, as the
pious par excellence who are certain of Paradise (Sura 62:6); on the
other hand Jews and Christian alike are reproached for thinking
themselves to be children of God specially beloved by Him (Sura
5:3
1
abna'u'lliihi wa'ailibbii'uhu). It is the pious who are in the
relation of wali to God, 'they need not fear and be sad:' i.e. they
may feel secure from the horrors that Muhammed summoned against
the unbelievers and profligates-since they would partake of the
Kingdom of heaven. From the general meaning of 'someone who is
close' in Old Arabic usage the word was extended to the protector,
helper and patron; curiously enough also applied to divinely
venerated beings of whom man believes that they help those who [287]
venerate them. The venerations of such beings, by which often
angels or even idols are meant, called shufa'ii' (sing. shaft') by those
who honour them, is sharply condemned in the Koran in many
passages (Sura 10:19; 13:17, 18; 39:44, etc.) and is branded as shirk;
the objects of such veneration and involation are called shurakii',
like the gods of polytheism. 'Those whom they invoke in God's
stead cannot create but are creatures themselves, they are dead not
1 In this sense waif is usually paraphrased by the synonym garin. al-Bayc;13,wl
on '9:46: cf. MafiUlb al.Ghayb. V, p. 682.
J Like the word mawlii (derived from the same root) in its original use;
see Part I. p. 101, note 3.
II Cf. MordtInan.Muller. Sabiiische Denkmtiler, p. 25 [Gesenius-Buhl,
HebrtJisches und aramti.isches Handw01'terbuch, under sh'rii].
" S'Clra 19:5, d. waH al-' aha= successor to the throne.
"Sttra. 5:56; this is however extended to unbelievers in general, 3:27, 45:I8.
"Silra 10:63. common in the second Sl1ra.. cr. 3:164. of those who fell in
religious wars, 41 :30. 43:68.
T In this sense. wali is also one of the names of God, Redhouse 'On the mQ$J
comely names', etc. jRAS, XII, p. 67. no. 529ff., 3:61 (God is the walt of th-e
believers), 42:27. In parallelism waif corresponds in this sense to or
shaff' (helper, intercessor, advocate), Sura 2:101; 4:47; 6:5r, 69; 9:75, II7.
I'
-
264 VOLUME TWO
living, and know not when they will be resurrected' (SUra 16:20-2),
and that this refers to beings called awliyii' is evident from a threat
referring to the same error: 'But do those who disbelieve think that
they can regard my servants apart from me as awliyar' Verily we
have prepared hell for the deniers of God' (r8:rQ2).
The impulse for the veneration of saints must indeed have been
very strong if it managed to attach itself to this very expression
which was so much decried in the Koran from the point of view of
the cult. Wal;, the pious devout man' became the wall equipped
with the attributes of miracle, the intermediary (shaft') between
God and man, 'those who are near to God through their obedience
and whom God equips with the gift of his mercy (hariima).'2 We will
now examine how the Muslim peoples shaped the image of such
persons.
III
In the opinion of Muslims a waif is not made through his deep
penetration into the divine secrets. Involuntary rapture, which is
not prepared for by the person concerned through study and
speculation, is the beginning and the visible sign of waif-ship.
People partaking of such a state are called majilhub. This word
[288] means etymologically the same as 'rapt' in its original acceptation:
one withdrawn. Muslims call any person inspired by God whose
ecstasy is due not to theosophical absorption but to spontaneous
illumination, majilhub. Thus a historian reports of Yilnus b. Yiinus
al-Shaybanl, the founder of the Yilnusiyya order: 'He had no
sheikh but was a majilh"b, he was rapt away (drawn away) to the
path of good." The group of popular waifs designated by this
name already during their lifetime is made up of such people. The
Muslim wal; is not canonized ouly after his death: during his lifetime
he is recognized as such by the people and practises his miracles for
all to see. The populace, realistically inclined, even finds it more
likely that a living waif shonld be more able to work miracles than
one who is dead. An Egyptian saint; Shams al-Din al-I;Ianafi (d.
847), teaches: 'When a wal; dies, his power over nature with which
he was able to lend help ceases. If however pilgrims to his grave
nevertheless obtain help or achieve the fulfilment of their desires,
lIn ancient linguistic usage waH in this context is the opposite of klifir.
A Kharijite poet says of the leader Qatari: wa'anta waHyyun wa't.Muhallabu
kiiftrun, Abu lfanifa Dinaw., p. 286. 18. I;3:assan b. Thabit says of Hasbimite
believers who fell at Milta; kumu awliya'u'lliihi, Ibn Hisham, p. 779, 3 from
the bottom.
S AI-Bayq.awi I, p. 914 (on Sl1ra Io:63).
• Al.Maqrlzi, Khita!, II, p. 435, 18: bal kana majdhubanjudhiba ilii.lariqi'l.
khayri. (Cf. 'MadjdhQb' in EI.]
VENERATION OF SAINTS IN ISLAM 265
this is Allah's deed wrought through the mediation of the respective
qulb who sends help to the pilgrim according to the degree of the
saint's grave that was visited:
'
We d ~ not intend to repeat the teachings of the Muslim mystics
on the hierarchy of the awliyii', beginning with the qulb (pole) down
to the last cunning, begging dervish, since these ideas have often
been described in European literatnre." The walis do not wait for
the masses to sing their praise; they themselves lead the chorus of
glorification. The boasts and self-praise of some of the more pre-
sumptious waifs are hardly credible. In order to base such behaviour
upon a sacred tradition, they make 'Ali, a man particularly called
waii Allah, to whom one of the first places is assigned amongst the
saints, say: 'I am the dot under the letter M', I am at the side of
God, I am the pen, I am the well-preserved tablet, I am God's [289]
throne, I am the seven heavens and the seven earths." Of Junayd
(d. 297), a ~ j j f i of the older school, the words are reported: 'God
has given no knowledge to man and allowed them no entry to it
without letting me participate in it," and this is a most modest
claim compared to what later saints say of themselves. Ibrahim
al-Dasiiqi, one of the four qulbs and a pre-eminent national saint of
Muslim Egypt, says of himself: 'God showed me what is in the
heig?ts when I was seven; at eight I read the well-guarded tablet;
at nme I solved the talisman of heaven and discovered in the first
sUra of the Koran the letter which dismays men and demons; at
fourteen I was able to move what rests and to make rest what moves
with the aid of God.' -- ,
Muhammed has given me power over the whole world, over
demons, over all bodies and devils,
and over China and the whole East to the borders of God's lands
my rule is justified;
I am the letter which not all who see it can read; the whole world
is snbject to me on my God's order, -
All this I do not say for boasting, but it was permitted to me so
that people maynot be ignorant of my way. 5
1 AI.Sha'rani, Biographies of $lifls (Ms. of Leipzig Univ. Library, no. 357),
£01. 4Gb. Cal. Tabaqiit al.Kubra, Cairo, 1299 II, p. 138].
:I Lane, .Manners and Cltstoms of the Modern Egyptia1M. II, pp. 290ff.;
Kremer, Hensch, Ideen, pp. 172ff., Barges, Vie dlt A bolt lVIedien, introduction;
and lastly VoIIers, ZDMG, XLIII, pp. us ff. [Cf. Goldziher's article 'Abdal'
as revised in the 2nd ed. o£the El].
a AI-Munawi, fol. ISb.
4. Abl1'I-Mal;tasin, II, p. I78.
$ 'Ali Basha. Mubarak al-Khitat al-]adida al·TawftqiY'Ya (Bfllaq, 1306), XI,
p.8.
[290]
266 VOLUME TWO
Poems are cited of Al.unad al-Badawi, the saint of Tanta in Egypt,
which remind one vividly of the vainglorious verses of the heroes
in the romances of 'Antar and of Sayf. One of these poems begins
thus: 'Before my existence I was a qu!b and imam, I saw the thr:,ne
and what is above the heaven, and I saw God as He revealed Hun-
self. I have no teacher and no example but the prophet ra,-Ha
(Muhammed) ... Nobody before or after me has obtained more than
a mustard-seed of the fniness of my knowledge.'-'Abd al-Qadir
al-Jili says of himself: 'Before the sun rises it greets me; before
year starts it greets me and reveals to me all that will happen dunng
its course. I swear by God's majesty that the blessed and the damned
are presented to me and that my eye rests upon the well-guarded
tablet of fate. I dip into the seas of God's knowledge and have seen
Him with my eyes. I am the living proof of God's existence. I am
the Prophet's lieutenant and his heir on earth." It is possible that
such vainglorious utterances were ascribed to the above-mentioned
saintly by later biographers only, and that they themselves were
innocent of such conceit. But that such a spirit predominates in the
wall groups of later times is seen from a curious document of this
literature, the autobiography of one of the most famous ,UI15: 'Abd
al-Wahhab A!).mad al-Sha'rani (d. 973). Under the guise of humble
thanks' to God for being granted wonderful gifts of the spirit and
sanctity-this is already inherent in the title of the book
3
-the
author tells me strangest things about his wonderful qualities, his
communication with God, the angels and the Prophet, about his
ability to work miracles and to find out the secrets of the universe,
etc. In the same way in which he describes the merits and miraculous
deeds of his saintly teachers and contemporaries in his work Lawaqi!t
aI-Anwiir he talks about himself-in order to thank God for having
considered him worthy of so many mercies.
In such circles the doctrine could easily arise that the walis were
greater even than the prophets; a which much arg<;-
mentation in theological circles. It IS hardly surpnsmg that thIS
conceit aroused the hatred of orthodox theologians for some rep-
resentatives of this trend. The fuqahii' were not always prepared to
put up with such presumption by the sufis. In Ibn Battuta's
there lived near 'Ayntab in Syria, in the mountains outside the CIty,
1 AJ.Biqa'i, III, foIs. 19b, 3rb, 35"
! This was the excuse of all Muslim authors who sounded the trumpet of
their own glOry, as e.g. al-Suyiltl, of Sitzungsberichlen aey Kais. Akademie
deY WW, phil. hist. d. LXIX, (1871), p. '28 This was called: aI·tab-addut/;
bi't·ni'am.
I Lata'?! al.Minan wa'l.akhliiq f! bayiin wujub al·ta1}adduth bi·ni'mat Allah
'alii'l.it1iiq, 1\15. of the Dresden Library, Fleischer, p. 6SH.. no. 392; Hungarian
Nat.IVIus., no. XV of my description, cf. ZDMG, XXXVIII p. 679 [GAL II,
p. 338,5 II,p. 466 ,repeatedly printed].

:1

VENERATION OF SAINTS IN ISLAM 267
an anchoret who was called 'sheikh of sheikhs' and to whom pil-
grimages were made in order to be blessed by him. This sheikh
once allowed himself the sentence that he was above Muhammed,
who could not live without women, whereas he himself was celibate.
This was too much for the qarjis of the four orthodox schools, w!1Qse
names are given in our source; they summoned the anchoret before
their court and condemned him to death.' This is but one of the many
examples of conflicts between the followers of sUfism and the
representatives of canonical theology.' These though
unable to detract from the high opinion that the latter had of true
saints, nevertheless filled the orthodox theologians with even
greater loathing of the circles to which the aspirants to wall-ship
belonged. The hostility between orthodox theologians and ,iifis
had its reason partly in the unorthodox dogmatics and exegesis
which developed within the ,ufi'schools, and partly in the way of
life-unbridled by the ritUal law and far from saintly-led by
wandering dervishes who so often abused siifis.
3
There were at all
times mystic orders who confessed the ibii!ta,' whose rules
state clearly that their members are completely free and exempt
from religious law.' It is true that pious souls easily reconciled this
contrast by denyfng their competence to judge the saints. 'As regards
the armies of sheikhs, walls, pious, and pure persons (May God give
us the benefit of their merits and by the blessings of the love for
God make us the servants of their thresholds) it is part of their
character to be visible to men in very rare cases only. Many of them
however are visible in order to guide God's servants-may God
increase their number and work good through them. It is everybody's
duty to believe in them and not to reject them. Even when we see
things about them of which we disapprove, this must be accounted
for by the circumstance that we are too short-sighted to be able to
judge their condition. How many of them subject thelllSelves to
public disapproval in order to hide their true circumstances! There-
fore it is better and more wholesome to interpret their deeds in a
favourable manner. The great sheikh Mu!).yi al-Din ibn 'Arabi at the
opening of his Meccan Revelations says: 'The highest happiness of
men is to believe in all those who ascribe to themselves a relation-
1 Ibn B.ttnt., IV, p. 3'8.
2: Cf. Ibn Khal1ikan, no. 850, a tendentious story about the theologians
declaring the!?CtiIs to be heretics=al-DamIri (s.v. dhubiib) I, p. 439.
• ZDMG, XXVIII, pp. 324fl.
.. Ci. al·GhazaJ.i, al-Munqidh min al-J)aliiJ, JA, 1877, I, p. 76, [and Die
Styeitschrift des GaziiJi gegen die lbiikiyya, ed. O. Fretzl, Sitzu'ngsber. dey
Bayerischer Ak. d. Wissensch., 1933, with the editor's introduction.] -
II E.g. the so-called l;Iariri: dervishes (sixth century). for the origin of which,
see Fawat al-Wafayat, II, p. 42, and all orders which call themselves Bf,·shar'
i.e. those exempt from the law, Sell, The Faith of Islam. p. 95. •
[291]
1 ekron. Jl.iekka, III, p. 406.
f: But not all theologians are so lenient. Cf. a remarkable statement by al·
Qastallani, VH, p. 295, on the conceit of the waIfs; he finds that So.ra 24:II
applies to them.
a The legend of this Raslan is to be found in Kremer, Mittelsyrien und
Damaskus. p. 156. A theosophical treatise (risiila tawMdiyya) by him in
Cat. ar. Brit. Mus., p. 4ooa, commentaries on it in Berl. Cat., II, pp. 563fi.•
ct. also D.C. no. 358 (fols. 44:ff.) and 412 of Leipzig Univ. Library [GAL I.
p. 589, S I, p. SII].
ship with God, even if this claim were not justified.' We beseech
God to assist us in the belief in His walis wherever they may be;
may He introduce ns into their midst and keep us apart from those
who slight them." These typical words by Qutb al-Din al-Nahra-
waH (tenth century) clearly show the relation of believing minds to
wandering humbugs clad in the mantle of saintliness, and this point
of viewstill dominates the thinking of the Muslimpeople even today.'
As regards the miracles ascribed to the saints, the conception of
orientals of the figures of the saint is guided by their unbridled
phantasy, by their desire to be edified by prodigies and entertained
by impossibilities-none of which are restricted by the limits that
art may set to the excesses of imagination. Their legends of saints
are full of features which are nothing but the religious application
of fairy literature of Indians and Persians. Only that here it is not
fairies and;'inn, 'children of the realm of lies: which bring to life the
most extraordinary combination, but the grace of God becoming
manifest in favour of His chosen ones. What appears as romantic
hyperbole in fairy tales becomes in the literature of the waifs a
miracle worked through God's mercy. There are lost rings inside
fish which give themselves up on the prayer of saints, visits of
saints to the inhabitants of the bottom of the sea, and many other
features well known to readers of the Arabian Nights. If it were not
for the aura of saintliness which surrounds the heroes of these
tales one would imagine oneself in the realm of Badr Basim and
Aladin. There is the chief saint of Damascus, Raslan or rather
Arslan (d. ca. 700),' who produced the change of the four seasons
within the span of a small hour; there are men of God who are
present at several places simultaneously or in contrast take di:fferent
shapes at the same place, who change gold to blood in order to
show vainglorious rulers what is the nature of this glitter for which
they hunt. The earth folds up for them so that spacial distance
disappears for the saints. A wali was in the mosque at Tarsus and
while praying he was overcome with the desire to make a pilgrimage
to the mosque of Medina; he put his head in the sleeve of his coat and
when he took it out again he was in Medina. This is one of the
most common occurrences to be met with in the biographies of
[292)
[2931
268 VOLUME TWO

VENERATION OF SAINTS IN ISLAM
26
9
saints.' The saints cause animals and stones to be given the faculty of
speech. The famous saint Ibrahim b. Adham sat in the shade of a
pomegranate tree, wh,:n, the tree said: '0, Abu do me the
ho,;our to eat of myfrurt. The wali accepted this invitation. The fruit
which up to then had been rather sour became sweet and the tree
produc,ed two crops a year. This kind of pomegranate was then
called pome.!5"anate of the servants God' (rummanat al-'abidf,n).
Another reached for a tree ill order to pick its fruit, when
the tre.e slUd: D? not eat of my fruit, because I belong to a Jew.'
cu.r_e and their prayers are always granted, every
sa:n
t
IS m'lJab al-du a . God destroys those who intend them harm.
Wild ';"In;als becon;e tame at their bidding and subject themselves
to theIr will. They nde on .lions, 'the dogs of God' (kilao Allah). One
of most remarkable. grfts of popular walis is ta!awwur, i.e. the
ability .to take o.n The miraculous ability often
comes ill usefnl ill th:"r conilicts with th,e legalism of ordinary
Qa<;lib al-Ban, a waif from Mosul, sheltered behind this
abilIty when he was accused of never being seen in prayer. In front
of the accuser he adopted various shapes and asked: in which of
these shapes have you seen me neglecting my prayers?' Muslims
develop the g;eatest sweeps of imagination in respect of this taiaw-
wur. The sheIkh Abu 'Abd Allah al-Qurashi had but one eye 'and
was leper, but h'; neverthe!es.; won the love of a young girl who,
despIte her par,:nts protests, mSlsted on marrying the saint. He then
adopted gmse of a .beautiful youth and affirmed his identity with
al-Qurashi. He kept thIS newshape in his dealings with his young wife
but appeared as before to all the rest of the world in the form of an
cnpple.· al-'Ara'ish in Morocco is the grave of a femaJe
samt of :t IS told she insinuated herself into the service
of the B.u m the guise of an ugly negress in order to
appear SIde at as a beautiful girl.'
.The abilIty to fly-;-thls too in ta!awwur-is one of the commonest
rmrac:ulous accomplishments of the awliya'; it enables them to visit
far distant places ill the shortest of times in order to watch over the
J. This presumably is based on Jewish sources: the tayy al.ard corresponds to
Tal. Bab:, foL 9Ib, Sanhedrin, fol. 9sa. Ibn I;!azm
In hIS K .. thIS legendary trait among the Jewish beliefs
dtsapproved of by hIm Ms. "Varner no. 480, fol. 87b=Vien. Cat. N.F.
no. 216. IS3b). 1317, I, p. 218; read /i.shiddati sur'atiki li.anna'l-
art!a tuw'tgat la before U-anna.] This feature is however also
used by Mushms outSIde the legends of saints Abu Dawod I Ib
Q
ta b d W" t j ld " p. 255, n
u y a, e . _us en e ,p. 9, 4, al-Qazwini, II, p. I IS.
. I Al.MunaWl, fol. 3, d. al·DamirI (s.v. fa/ir) II, p. III, where a similar legend
IS told of 'Umar b. al-FariQ..
a AJ.Biqa'i, IV, fols. Sb, 19b.
.. G. Charmes in Rev. d. mondes. June 1S86, p. 870.
[294]
270 .vOLUME TWO
interests of their disciples and adepts and to be present wherever
they are required. There is a popular belief that specially inspired
people are able to see above their heads, walls riding in the air on
noble horses (najii'ib), and satirical doubters used this belief for
many amusing anecdotes.'--Amongst the other accomplishments
of wallS, the ability to speak many languages deserves mention"
as does the ability to move mountains,' etc.; a figure of speech in
J"wish and Christian religious literature is thus made into a factual
occurrence in these miracle tales and has also been incorporated
even in ancient times into the biography of the Prophet.
Muslim hagiologists summarized the miracles of the saints in
twenty categories! at the head of which they usually mention
iityii' al-mawtii, the power to revive the dead.' Apart from and
also within these categories the provincial peculiarities of the legends
of saints must not, however, be overlooked, since they are im-
portant for gaining insight into the ethnological factors responsible
for the origin and development of the legends. It is, for example, a
typically Maghribi feature that the saint wanders with his disciples
through desolate areas and at one point sticks his staff into the
[295] ground, whereupon water springs from the ground and lush vegeta-
tion appears in the desert. The ziiwiya
G
of the saint is then founded
at such an oasis and brings blessing and salvation to later genera-
tions. This occurs frequently in the biographies of Maghribi saints
which were collected and described by Trumelet.' The North African
character of these legends is also seen in the fact that wherever
we meet them outside North Africa' they are connected with Berber
dervishes on the pilgrimage to Mecca. The cisterns of Yemen only
produce drinkable water because two Maghribi saints were buried
in that area.
9
IV
Before going further we should like to answer another question:
'What is the position of women in the hagiology of Islam?"· Because
1 Al.Sharbini Hazz at.Qub;uf (lith. ed.), pp. 109, 12-0.
• Cl. ZDMG, XXVI, pp. 770ft .
.. Abu'l-Mal;1asin, I, p. 429.
4 AI.Munawi, fo1. 30b.
II Cf. Disput. relig..Mohammed., p. 129.
II Ziiwiya= Eastern kMi:nqa, pI. khawiiniq, Ibn Battuta, I, p. 71 [d. s.v.].
7 Les saints de 1'1slam. Legendes hagiologiques et croyances algeriennes (vo1. I),
Les Saints du Tell. Paris, 1881.
9 Doughty, Travels in Arabia Deserta. I, p. 140.
i Voyage de l'Inde a la Mekke par 'Abdoul Khym, ed. Langles (Paris, 1797),
p.201.
10 [For this chapter d. M. Smith, Riibi'a Ihp.1.1ystic and her Fellow·Saints in
Islam, Cambridge, I928.]

"
1'0-

VENERATION OF SAINTS IN ISLAM
of their treatment, Islam is helq in such evil repute that we might
easily assume that it assigns no place to women when the highest
degree of human perfection is in question. Dr Perron, who has made
the position of women amongst Arabs the subject of a detailed
monograph, mentions only one woman saint; the famous Rabi'a
al-' Adawiyya. This author sums up this phenomenon with the
words: 'In Islam women rarely walk the path of saintliness. It is too
difficult for them-at least this is what men think. All brilliance,
merit and honour goes to the men. They have turned everything to
their own advantage and privilege; they have taken for themselves
and monopolized everything-even saintliness and Paradi:;e.'1
This statement agrees with the idea which is usually propounded
of the position of women in Islam in respect of law and with regard
to religious merit and religious responsibility. But in order to
observe historical justice it must be admitted that degradation of
women in Islam" is the result of social influences' for which the
principles of Islam are unjustly made responsible, but which were in
fact the outcome of the social relations of the peoples converted to
Islam. But even this must not be taken too far. It is true that Islam
itself (though as regards the legal position of women it was an
advance on the Jahiliyya) placed women, as even its eager apologists
must admit' far lower than men on the social scale;' women are
called 'the majority of those in Hell," 'aql wa-dln,' i.e.
lacking in understanding and religion.' This however does not
exclude women from the spiritual endowments with which Islam
intended to benefit all mankind. In the earliest times of Islam there
are many proofs of the influence that women had upon the public
affairs and political movements of the young Muslim community.
There were not only pious women-presumably successors of the
pre-Islamic niisikiit'-who gladly proved their piety by services
1 Femmes arabes avant et depuis l'islamisme (Paris-Algiers. 1858), p. 350.
S This is shown in principles expressed in a most noteworthy passage in Agh.
X, p. 154. cf. also later l;1.adiths in al-DamirI (s.v, al·gnuriib), II, p. 205.
a Kremer, Culturgesch., II, pp. 106:ff.
• E.g. (van Bemmelen) L'Egypte et l'Europe, II (Leiden, 1884), p. 654, cf.
Bosworth Smith, Mohammed and Mohammedanism (2nd ed., London, 1875),
P·242.
J This is not peculiar to Islam, cf. the commentary to Genesis 2:21 in _de
Lagarde, 11.1aterialien zur Geschichte tmd Kritik d. Pentat., I, p. 31, 28ft.
C B. Iman, no. 19 (ed. Krehl, no. 21).
1 Muslim, I. p. 159,
e Labid, ed. Huber 26:12; a hero who for the whole night crouches in
ambush with ruffled hair and covered with dust is compared to nasika,t
waiting for the offering of the votive sacrifice. For the kahinat of the ancient
Arabs see Kremer, Stud. zur vergl. Culturgesch. (1890), Part 2, p. 76. Perhaps
the shaykha raqud in 'Abid b. al·Abral? v. 39 (Hommel, Aujstltze und Abhand-
ltmgen. p. 60) red. Lyall. r:36] also belongs to this context. It is not impossible,
[296]
1 Ibid., n, p. 369.
S Ibid., p. 235.
a Ibid., p. 336.
'- Burton, Personal Narrative of a Pilgrimage to Mecca and Medina (Leipzig,
1874), II, p. 237: cf. Didier [SijouY chez le Grand-cht!Yije de la Mekke, p. 196,
German trans].] Ein Aufenthalt bei dem Gross-Scherij von Mekka, p. 245.
• K. al-Bayan, fo!. 48b [II, pp. 167-8].
• Ansiib al·Ashriif, p. 92.
7 Quoted in Ibn !;Iajar. IV, p. 763. [The correct form is Ku'ayba bint
see Ibn Sa'd, VIII. p. 213.]
legends. A number of these are told on the authority of al-Nawar
bint Malik, as for example a vision that celestial light surrounded
the urn in which 'Ali's head was kept and that a white bird fluttered
around it.' The anti-Umayyad conspirators at held their
meetings after the acession of Yazid at the house of Maria bint Sa'd,
a woman from the tribe of 'Abd al-Qays who was a zealous follower
of the 'Alids.
2
Amongst the many moving episodes of the tragic and
desperate fight carried out by J:Iusayn for the rights of his family,
we hear how Umm Wahb, the wife of a zealous follower of the
pretender, grabbed a tent-pole and stepping up to her husband
addressed him thus: 'I offer my father and mother as ransom for
you. Go and fight for the rights of Muhammed's descendants.'
When her husband sent her back to the women she took hold of his
dress saying: 'I shall not leave y;'u but rather will I die with you: .
and when he was killed in the battle she greeted his corpse with the
words: 'May Paradise agree with yoU.'3 This also calls to mind.
Asmii.', the daughter of Abu Bakr, who stood at the side of her son
'Abd Allah b. al-Zubayr and encouraged him during his struggle
with al-I;Iajjaj, and who would not tolerate her son's wearing a mail
shirt when going into battle, since this was unworthy of a man who
fights for what he was convinced was a just cause. In the early period
of Islam, women-who have been claimed as examples for some
modern heroines of the Arabian desert'--vied with their heroic
menfolk in their enthusiasm for the difficult wars to which they were
called. When J:Iabib b. Maslama al-Fihri (d. 42) was about to leave
on one of those expeditions which occupied most of his life, his wife
asked him: 'Where do you go?' 'Either into the enemy camp,'
replied I;Iabib, 'or, if Allah so wills, to Paradise.' 'At both places I
wish to arrive first: said his wife. In the event, I;Iabib met her later
in the enemy camp, which she had reachedbefore him. 5 The murderer
of the Kbarijite chief Niifi' b. al-Azraq faced a woman who chal-
lenged him to single combat in order to avenge Niifi"s murder.'
Apart from participation in political affairs, we also encounter
women as priests of humanity and philanthropy in the midst of the
terrors of war. Ibn Sa'd tells of a woman of the Aslam tribe, Kulayba
bint Sa'id, 7 who, during the battle of Khaybar, first started a field
[297]
272 VOLUME TWO
rendered for the sake of the worship of God,' but there were also
women who participated in the internal and external battles.
2
The
figure of the heroic Nw,ayba
3
does not emerge from a soci<:ty in
which women are considered similar to slaves; and the role of 'A'isha
and her influence upon the affairs of the young state in its first
gathering of strength must be viewed from other than the standpoint
of a Turkish harem intrigue. After Snouck's demonstration' it is no
longer necessary to refute in detail the mistaken assumption that
the disguising and hiding of women and their separation from all
social intercourse have their cause in the law of early Islam. In the
earliest generation of Islam the wife of MU'?'ab b. al-Zubayr (d. 72).
who showed her face unveiled to all and sundry, could say: 'Allah
has blessed me with beauty and I love the world to look at it and
recoguize that I am superior to all and that there is no blemish in
my beauty." To be sure, Islam does demand modest reserve from
women, as was also required by good breeding under paganism-
the chaste woman is in the khidr;' but this does not completely
cut women off from the interests of the world. The earliest history
of Islam has manyexamples of this.
The sympathy which the female sex showed to the unfortunate
cause of J:Iusayn' and the 'Alids is truly remarkable. 'Women also
have their share in inventing, elaborating, and circulating 'Alid
1 Umm MiJ.1jan, al-MllwaUa', II, p. II, Ibn I;rajar, IV, p. 784.
2 One should not, however, overlook al-Tabari's remark, I, p. 1926. I: that
the Arabs did not like their 'women to be present at battles.
S Ibn l:fajar, IV, p. 807; Sprenger, Mohammad, III, p. 176.
"Twce popuJaire dwalingen verbetcrd' BTLV. 58 volgr. I, pp. :toif. of the
offprint [VerspYeide Geschrijten, I, pp. 305f1.]. Cf. from an earlier date Hammer·
Purgstall, JEAS, IV (1837), p. 17:2, note; D'Escaymc de Lauture, Lc Desert
etle Soudan (German eeL, Leipzig, 1855). p. 63,
'Agh., X, p. 54.
4 Cf. \Vellhausen, Reste arab. Heidenthums, p. 146; rabbat al·khidr, in
Noldcke, Beitr. Poesie, p. 85, 6-J1,1u!aq4al., 29:1, baytjatu khidri1t, Imrq.,
Mu'all, v, 23. Plural: bayc]at al·kkudiir, l;lam., p. 250 V. 2. It seems however
that these expressions refer in the first instance to unmarried girls (B. 'Idayn,
no. 15: ai· 'awatiq dhawiif al-khudur, in a later poet: 'awCitiqu lam fakun tada'u'l-
Mjiila, Dhu·l-Rumma, khiz. Adab., IV. p. 107, 6 Irom below [ed. Macartney
57:62] as wen as mukhabba'at. Zuhayr, 1:36 (ed. Landberg, p. 159 v. 4); cf.
al- 'adhra'a fi'l-na$ifi, Hudhayl., 237:Q, 278:40 (for B. Jihad, no. 5
na$if of the maidens of Paradise); al- 'adhra:u Ii khidriha, B. Adab, no. 76.
See further references in respect of related expressions in Oest. Monatsschr·fd.
Orient, Xl, p. 156, bottom. N.B. (lam" p. 750 v. I: ghazatun muqanna'u, a
veiled deer (of a young girl).
7 AI-Tabarl, II, p. 459, the women from the tribe of Hamdan.
however, thatnasikiit means Christian women =rawahib, sing. rahika who dress
in fnusu?> (bair shirt). I;Iassan, Diwan, p. 25, 7 red. Hirschfeld] and abstain from
wine, :E:Iumayd b. Tha'l,\'T, Kitab al-A4diid, p. 224, z£f. For the women of the
Jiihiliyya cf, Aug, D.-Ii.il1er, lsI., I, p. 47·
I
VENERATION OF SAINTS IN ISLAM
273
[298]
[299]
1 An institution which in later centuries became an established part of
Muslim warfare, Ibn Khallikan, nO. 367. al-MaqqarI, I. p. 548 [Ibn at-Qifti,
P·4
0
5J·
2 For instance that women may not reach the grade of a nab!:; after Muham-
med, however, there are to be no more prophets in any case, even among men.
But even in this point a theologian of the fourth century deviated from the
usual doctrine and gained thereby the disapproval of the masses, Ibn Bash-
kuwaJ. no. 1957, p. 479, bottom.
S The course of Hfe broke through the barrier which later theology did not
omit to erect; aI-BayQ.8.wI to Sflra 14:38 (I, p. 207, 22): khu§§u (al'l'ijaJ) bi'l·
twbuwwa wa'l-imarna wa'l-walaya.
4. Mul;lammad al.'Abdarl, al·Madkhal (Alexandria, r293), II, p. 18.
r. Al.Munawi. fol. 23a.
hospital'in the mosque where she tended the sick and wounded. The
Koran itself contradicts the view that woman have no access to
'sanctity and Paradise'; it is enough to look at the many passages
which refer to mu'minun and mu'miniit, and $iilihiit in the
same breath and presuppose their full equality (esp. Sura 33:35).
This proves that neither the position of women in the oldest
movements of the Muslim community nor the teachings of the
founder of the new religion were--<lespite some theological limita-
tions of entirely theoretical nature
2
-to prevent women from
achieving, in inner religious life and in the consciousness of believers,
the same importance as men, to prevent the veneration of the awliyii'
(when it developed in Islam) from being extended to women" whom
the consensus of the believers raised to that height. And in fact
when informing ourselves of Muslim life at various ages and when
looking in the cemeteries at the graves of saints, we realize that
women occupied a rather different position from that stated by
Perron. Much is heard of women saints (shaykhiit) from the earliest
to the most recent times. Their names are known and their saintly life
and their pious deeds and miracles (kariimiit) are spoken of with
reverence. Theologians hostile to the excesses of the .iif"lS declaim
also against these female saints and the veneration which surrounds
them. <Not long ago the oriental newspaper reported the impressive
funeral of such a female saint, the Sheikha Amina in Alexandria.
There can be but few books on the biographies of saints which
fail to mention a number of women saints under every letter of the
alphabet, wondrous deeds are no less marvellous than those of the
men dealt with in the same works. It is characteristic that some theo-
logians name as the first representative of the dignity of qu[b (one of
the most prominent in the hierarchy of the awliyii) a woman:
Fatima.
5
There is full equality between the sexes in the field of
saintliness. In the relevant literature there is even a special mono-
graph about the biographies of women saints written by the sheikh
Taqi al-Din Abu Bakr al-I;Iusni entitled: 'Lives of believing and
[300]
274 VOLUME TWO VENERATION OF SAINTS IN ISLAM 275
pious women walking in the path of God." The author intended as
he states in the preface to his book, that his female readers shocl.d
take to heart the examples of piety and moral sanctity found in it.
Therefore in drawing the moral he frequently addresses the women
of his time in severe tones: yii nikii' hiidhii '/-zamiin, 'Woe and woe
again, 0 women of this age: he says in the biography of the pious
I;Iasana (fol. 45b); 'You are just her opposites. You delight in the
sons of this world. If your husband is godless and indulges in
intoxicating drinks and commits other sins you delight in him even
though his behaviour rouses God's anger; and you avoid the pious
man though he finds favour with God. A curse upon you! How
little delight do you take in things that will bring you closer to
Allah.'
It is however not the warlike Islam, which employs measures of
violence, the religion Ii'hommes as Renan calls it, that produced
women saints; it is the Islam full of mystical and ascetic leanings
that fostered these female saints" those ziihiliiit and 'iibidiit, the
accounts of which fill the Muslim books. There are also congregations
of women which were the seminaries of female saints, convents for
women. It may appear strange to hear of Muslim nuns and Muslim
convents, as if there could be even stricter and more extensive
isolation of women than is inherent in the harem. Al-Maqrizi, in his
chapter on convents (riMp) in Egypt, mentions an institution
called RiMt al-Baghdadiyya (convent of the Baghdad woman):
'this house was built by Madame (khiitan) Tadhkarpas, the daughter
of Malik al-Zlihir Baybars in 684 A.H. for Zaynab, daughter of
Abjj'-I-Barakat, which pious sheikha is usually called 'daughter of
the Baghdad womau' (bint at-Baghdiidiyya). In this institute the
princess erected a house for this sheikha and other pious women.
To this day the house is known for the piety of its inmates, who
are always headed by a lady superior who provides religious teaching
to the others and who leads them in pious exercises and instructs
them in religious sciences. The last lady superior of the house known
to us was the pious sheikha, mistress of the women of her epoch,
Urnm Zaynab Fatima of Baghdad, daughter of 'Abbas, who died
in the month Dhii'I-I;Iijja of the year 714 aged above eighty. She
was a scholarly woman who renounced all worldly goods, was satis-
fied with little, was God-fearing, and walked in God's way, zealous
in furthering spiritual profit and devout exercises and of sincere
piety. from Damascus and Cairo were taught by her;
she msplfed trust m everyone and exerted great influence upon souls
with her teaching. After her death all the lady superiors of this
1 Siyar al-Siilikiit al·Mu'miniit al·Khayriit, Ms. Leipzig Univ. D.C., no. 368
[GAL II, p. 117, S II, p. II2].
Z Kremer,Hensch. Ideen, pp. 63-5.
[301]
convent received the title 'the Baghdad woman.' Women who had
been repudiated by their husbands used to retreat to this house and
live there, in order to preserve their repntation also until they made a
new marriage; for the house was under strict discipline, the inmates
being always busy with religious exercises, and anyone who violated
the rules of the house was punished by the superior. In consequence
of the events of 806 the institute decayed. It is supervised by the
chief qiiq.; of the J:Ianafites'.'
Fonnerly there were women's convents also in 1\:1ecca; Mul).ammad
al-Fa$i (b. 775, d. 832 in Mecca), MaJikite qiiq.i of the holy city,
mentions in his history and topography of Mecca, among the founda-
tions of the holy city, the convent of Bint al-Taj. 'I do not know:
says al-Fa,l, 'who founded it; it is more than 200 years old (the book
was finished in 8Ig), and from an inscription on the gate it was
founded for pious $ufi women
2
who wished to live in Mecca per-
manently.' Further he says: 'To these foundations belongs a convent,
behind the convent of al-DurI, which is for women: this institution
still existed in the middle of the seventh century.' Finally: 'There
are two convents near al-Durayba, one is called Ribat Ibn al-Sawda',
and in the inscription on its gate it is related that on Rabi' I, 5go,
Umm Khalil Khadija and Umm'Isa Maryam, both daughters of
'Abd Allah al-Qasimi, founded these two convents for pious Sufi
women belonging to the Shafi'ite rite who vowed to lead a celibate
life. The latter was also called the convent of Hirrish.'3 There are
Muslim nuns also in North Africa. Al-Bakri mentions a place near
Susa named Monastir, remarking that this is a place for pilgrimage
for women living like dervishes.'
We have seen that in Islam there was not only the possibility of
the rise of the idea of women saints but that also the social con-
sequences of this concept appeared here just as elsewhere. The female
saints of Muslim legends are equipped with the same power to work
miracles as the walis and they partake, during their life and after
their death, in the same honours. Though profound theological
scholarship was, as we saw at the beginning of the previous chapter,
not an indispensable attribute of saints, it is frequently emphasized
in the biographies of the sheikhas as a special claim to glory; showing
the widespread belief that Islam considers the cultivation of 'il",
1 Khitat, II, p. 428. Of the building no trace is left now, 'All BashaMubarak.
AZ.f{hi!a! aZ-Jad!da aI- Tawflqiyya. VI, p. 53·
2. The title 8ufiyya is often met with among pious women, e.g. Abo.·l-
Mahasin, II, p. 224. 4 from below, a saintly worker of miracles, Fatima bint
'Abd al-Rahman {d. 312). In Ibn Bashkuwal, no. II92, p. 537. a SfLn is men·
tioned from' the beginning of the fourth century who married a Siifiyya whose
mother also was a Si'lfiyya.
8 ekron. 11,1ekk., II, pp. 114-15.
<I. [Ed. de Slane, p. 36, quoted by] Yaq1i:t, IV. p. 661.
[302]
276 VOLUME TWO VENERATION OF, SAINTS IN ISLAM 277
as exclusively masculine prerogative to be exaggerated.' Ancient
Islam made the study of religious science obligatory to all believers
irrespective of sex,
2
and women had in earlier centuries a much
larger share in religious science than is usually appreciated.
3
It is understandable that popnlar belief in Islam was most ready
to call saints those women who were connected with the beginnings
of Islam. The followers of the family of 'Ali are especially ready to
elevate the women of this sacred family to the sphere of sanctity.
Much as Islam attached to 'Ali's fanilly the concept-raised to a
mystical plane-of martyrdom, it also considered the women of this
family from a higher viewpoint. Cairo is of all Sunnite cities the one
most steeped in 'Alid reminiscences, as a result of the Fatimid rule
there. This city harbours J:Iusayn's head and the grave of Zayd,
the grandson of J:Iusayn, who fell victim in Killa to the Umayyad
caliph Hisham but whose body miraculously reached Cairo. The
graves of pious women of the family of 'Ali are also shown here,
such as those of Umm Kulthilm, Sitta J awhara, the servant of Sitta
Nafisa, as well as that of S. Nafisa herself, who was a true saint.'
The legends woven around her memory may give an indication of
the Islamic concept of women saints. S. Nafisa was a great grandchild
of the caliph and martyr J:Iasan and daughter-in-law of the Imam
Ja'far al-Sadiq. She was famous for her piety and zeal in religious
practices; she made the pilgriJ,nage to Mecca thirty times, she
fasted most frequently and revived the nights (i.e. stayed awake in
prayer and holy exercises), she prayed much and did penance, and
ate only every third day and sparingly at that. She knew the Koran
and its explanations by heart and was so well versed in religious
knowledge that her great contemporary, the Imam al-Shafi 'I, greatly
admired her scholarship. She dug her own grave before her death,
and when the pit was finished she sat in it reciting the Koran a
hundred and ninety times; just as she was reading the word ral;",at
(mercy) her soul left her body and sped to the Lord of Mercy.
Her miracles are without number. We will just mention a few of
the most famous. When she moved from Arabia to Egypt she came
1 The well·known Egyptian scholar sheikh Rifa'a al·Tahtawl (d. I873)
endeavoured, from an apologetic point of vie\v, to disprove this opinion in a
special treatise; ct. an extract from it in ]acoub Arlin Pascha's L'instruction
publique en Egypte (Paris, I8go), pp. 122ff.
t This is expressed in the l)adlth: [alab al-'ilm jaritja 'ala kull muslim wa-
muslima.
8 See Excursuses and Annotations.
4 Cf. Mehren 'Revue des monuments funeraires du Kerafet ou de Ia ville .des
morts hors du Caire' (Melanges asiatiques tires du Bulletin del'.Academieimper.
d ~ s Sciences de St. Petersburg, IV (r8JI) pp. 564-566 [L. Massignon, 'La Cite des
Morts au Caire: Bt,Uetin de Z'Institut franvais d'archCologic orientare, LVII
«958), pp. z5ff.]
[303]
278 VOLUME TWO
into the neighbourhood of a dhimmi family (Christian or Jewish)
[304J where there was a girl suffering from gout who was unable to move
her limbs freely and had to lie quite still. Once her parents left their
home in order to buy food in the market and they asked their pious
Muslim neighbour to look after the unfortunate invalid during their
absence. Nafisa, full of love and mercy, accepted the task. When
the parents of the sick child had left the house the saint performed
her ritual ablutions and turned to Allah with devout prayers for the
recovery of the unconscious child. Hardly had she ended her prayers
when the patient regained control of her limbs and hunied towards
her returning parents. The grateful parents did not hesitate to
become Muslims.
Once the Nile failed to rise and irrigate the dry land. The country
was facing a terrible drought and famine. The people were desperate
and all prayers and show of repentance were of no avail; the river
remained obdurate. At that point Nafisa handed her veil to the
unhappy citizens so that they might throw it into the Nile. This was
hardly accomplished when the level of the river began to rise and the
people, terrified of death by hunger, saw abundance as rarely
before. The people of Cairo regard the grave of this saint as a
privileged place where prayers are said with certainty of fulfilment.
The saintly woman, who during her life never refused to intercede
on behalf of the unhappy and needy, still continues to do so even
after her death, nor does God leave unanswered a prayer on behalf
of which Nafisa intercedes.'
The legends of Nafisa represent a type of legend about women
saints which are spread in the east and west of the Islamic world. We
stress this geographical spread of such legends in order to forestall a
prejudice which several ethnographical writers have recently ex-
pressed. A difference is established concerning women saints, ex-
pressed in a categorical form by Kobelt in his Skizzen aus Algerien:
'We never find women saints among the Arabs, only among the
Berbers." It is true that the Maraboutism of women has strongly
[305] developed amongst the Berbers' and the reason for this--as well
as for other phenomena of the cult of saints in the Maghrib-is
found in the pre-Islamic antecedents of Maghribi Islam.' But to
1 Kh#al. II, p. 441. We now have a detailed description of Sitta NafIsa's
grave and of her legend in P. Ravaisse, 'Sur trois m.i.Q.rabs en bois sculpte'
in Memoires presentes et Ius a l'Institut egyptien [eL El, s.v. 'Nafisa']. II,
(Cairo, ,88g). pp. 66IfI.
t Globus, 1885. no. 3, p. 40, cf. Trumelet Les Saints du Tell. I, p. XLVIII.
Ii One need only recall the cult of Lellah Setti in Tlemsen (Barges, TZemren,
p. I32). of LelIa Minana in al·'Arish (Rohlfs, EYster Au/enthalt in Marokko.
P·3
6
7)·
'Cf. ZDMG, XLI, p. 55. Procopius, De bello vand., II, chap. 8, on women
foretelling the future.
VENERATION OF SAINTS IN ISLAM 279
question the ability of Arabic Islam to conceive the idea of women
saints is not justified.
v
We will not concern ourselves further in the present study with
living walis as the object of veneration. The above specimens taken
from popular superstition (III) may be justified as oriental contri-
butions to the knowledge of folklore, for the study of which material
is at present being diligently collected in the most varied fields. We
shaII tum to the cult which is attached in Islam to dead walis. This
is usually connected with the graves of saintly persons and more
rarely with the places which played some part in their lives.
(I)
Though already in the Meccan cult, as it developed during the
early days of Islam, a prominent place was awarded to the sacred
places taken over from pagan traditions transformed to link them
with Ibrahim, it is nevertheless noticeable that in the most ancient
times of Islam the tendency to attribute special efficacy to places
which were connected with saintly persons did not yet prevail.
The sacred memorial places of the Ka'ba associated with patIiarchal
times had their origin, like the whole Islamic cult of the Ka'ba,
in the need to make acceptable to the new order pagan ceremonies
which, because of the Arab character attached to ancestral tradition
were indispensable. We have no certain information whether and t ~
what extent the area of sacred places was extended beyond these
limits during the first decades. The fact that the Prophet's birth-
place was used as an ordinary dwelling-house during Umayyad
time and was made a house of prayer
'
only by al-Khayzuran (d:
173), the mother of Harun al-Rashid, would suggest that the con- [306]
secration of places associated with the legend of the Prophet did not
date from the earliest period of Islam.' Probably the reports of the
chroniclers who push back the consecration of the Islamic memorials
to an early period prove only that the sanctity of such places was
well established at the chronicler's time. Thus, for example, are to be
understood the report of Waqidi that mosques were erected' at
places where the Prophet had prayed, or the communication of
Tabari, which has no isniid and is based on hearsay' only, that 'the
house of Khadija' where Muhammed lived with his first wife was
made a sacred place as early as by Mu'awiya. In effect, even Muslim
'"fab., 1. P·968.
:t Cf. Snouck Hurgronje, Mekka, I, p. 2I.
:& Wiqidi-Wellhausen. p. z08.
~ ftmii dhukira, Tab., I, p. lI30' 3.
1 Cf. e.g. al.Azraqi, p. 4"25. to aZ.m.uUaka.
:I: Tab., I, p. 1268. .. .
:I B. Maghiiz't, no. 37: in al-Qastallani. VI, p. 391 It IS mentIoned on the
authority of Ibn Sa'd that 'Umar had felled the tree when he heard that
prayers were said near it.
40 Al.Azraqi, p. 424; d. Snouck Hurgronje, Het Feest, p. 123,
note "2 [Verspreide Geschr. I, p. 82]. Later the memory of thIS sacred place
disappeared al-Fasi (eighth century) 'writes: al-I:Iudaybiya and the mosque
(of the tree) are quite unknown today, Chron. Mekk., II, p. 83, 6. I was
to find out whether the veneration of the lotus of the Prophet near Ta If
(Sidrat al.Nabf, also called simply aI-Sidra, al-Fa-kihi, Ch.ron. I!, :p,
3) which is connected with a miracle by the Propbet, stIll contrnues; It IS stIll
mentioned in the tenth century; Disput. relig. Jl,Iohamrned., p. 245.
historians sometimes express doubts about the significance of some
of these sanctuaries.
'
With the successive elevation of the Prophet's character, which
from popular belief also penetrated into doctrine, active reverence
for such memorial places increased more and more. Even the
minutest episodes of the Prophet's life were perpetuated topo-
graphically. Thus, for example, the place where his cooking pot
stood, when in the first year of the flight he prepared food under a
tree for himself and his companions, in Batl)a ibn Azhar, was
pointed out.' Since the fixing of such memorial places had bee?
neglected in the earliest times, it can be easily realized that their
later perpetuation is devoid of all historical basis. People were not
particularly worried about the credentials and the authenticity
of the sacred places. Tariq b. 'Abd al-Ral)man reports that he
passed a mosque on his pilgrimage in which he saw people praying.
In reply to his question he was told that this mosque had been
erected in memory of the 'homage under the tree' at the spot where
it had taken place. Tariq told this to Sa'id b. al-Musayyib (d. 93),
who said, 'My father, who himself was one of those who paid homage
to the Prophet under the tree, could a year later no longer give the
location of this event. The companions of the Prophet thus com-
pletely forgot the place of their submission: and no:" you say
[307] have found it again and know about it." In the thIrd century, m
al-Azraqi's days, the 'mosque of the tree' already had another mean-
ing. It no longer was meant as a reminder of the homage under the
tree but of a legend of a miracle: at that spot was a tree .whi<;h
the Prophet asked about something, whereupon the tree IS Sald
to have moved to the Prophet, to have stood in front of him,
and to have returned to its original place after the discussion was
over.4.
The further we move on in time the more richly blossoms the
reverence towards holy memorial places. In Mecca itself the sacred
graves are on the increase. It is claimed that ninety-nine graves of
1 In al-Damiri (s.v. al-nasf'), II, p. 413, bottom.
• Ibn Batt";a, I, p. 333.
• Ibid., pp. 286ft.
" AI-BaHidhurI. p. 93.
I> Cf. Waqidi-Wellhausen. pp. 143£.
28r
VENERATION OF SAINTS IN ISLAM
prophets--especially from the time of the patriarchs-were found
between the black stone and the ZalllZalll.' The stone upon whiell
the Prophet rested on his return from his' Umra is pointed out, as is
the stone in Abu Bakr's house which greeted the Prophet during
the absence of the master of the house." Naturally it is in Medina
and its close environs that the oldest traditions of Islalll are kept
alive through local reminiscences, mashahia. In the middle of the
mosque at Quba is shown the spot where the call1el, on which the
Prophet rode, knelt down, and in the courtyard of the same building
there is a niche which commemorates the moment when the Prophet
made his first Yak' a. In Medina the sites of the houses of the first
caliphs are shown and the cistern the water of which becallle sweet
through the Prophet's spittle. Outside Medina the stone is shown
from which dripped olive oil at ,the Prophet's order; a qubba is
built over the stone and it need not be added that prayer at this
sacred place and by the many graves of companions and helpers
which are to be found in the territory of Medina is considered as
particularly efficacious.' It is interesting that more important his- [308]
torical moments, and not only personal associations, are also the
occasion to declare certain spots sacred. During the reign of al-
Ma'mun a mosque was erected on the spot where the followers of
Muhammed defeated the false prophet Musaylima, thus saving the
whole of Islalll from a grave danger.
4
In the meantime veneration of saints was continuously advancing.
The ideas growing from this new element of religious life led the
mind of the believers to sacred places of a very different type. The
graves of saints are visited as sacred places for worship or, as we
shall see, old pagan sanctuaries are reinterpreted as Muslim graves
of saints. A peculiar cult of graves develops in the forms of which the
old pagan traditions of the people concerned often live on, but
transferred to the veneration of graves of saints arising on Islamic
bases. The original form of the veneration of such graves consisted
in visiting the graves of martyrs in order to greet them. It was
believed that the answering greeting on the part of the pious men
they were visiting could be heard. Nobody liked the last resting
place of such men to pass without showing his reverence.' As early
as the second century a sort of cult was attaelled to this habit
which grew out of simple revereJ;lce. We find energetic polemics
against suell a cult in the earliest l)adith (see the last section of this
study).
--
VOLUME TWO 280
309]
VOLUME TWO
The visiting of these graves was motivated by more than just
reverence for those resting in them, since it was believed that
through the pilgrimage to the grave, prayers said there, and votive
offerings, one could obtain the he]p of the saint, or, as this belief
was attenuated to fit Islamic theory, that one could obtain his
intercession on behalf of the petitioner, or in generalWI-tabarruk,'
gain his blessing through pious remembrance of the saint and
veneration of his memory. Belief in the efficacy of visits to graves
was unshakeable among the people. A number of legends express the
confidence of the people that saints whose graves were visited in
times of utter distress will lend help by extraordinary means. Even
the remission of debts may be obtained by the pious through the
intercession of the saint whose qubba he visits rcverently. The legend
of Layth b. Sa'd-called Abii'I-Makarim, i.e. father of mercy or the
merciful one-resting in the Qarafa of Cairo has been told else-
where." A man harassed by creditors found upon his grave a bird
learned in the Koran, with which the poor man caused such a
sensation in Cairo that the sultan bought this bird from him for a
sum which was more than enough to help him out of his distress.
It is not surprising that according to this and similar legends even the
remission of debts is within the sphere of saints if it is borne in mind
that the saint involved represents God in this case also. In some of
the oldest Muslim prayers God is implored to remit debts. An old
evening prayer runs: '0 God, master of heaven and earth who
splittest the corn's seed and the kernel of the date, who hast revealed
the Torah, the Gospel and the Koran, I seek refuge with Thee from
the wickedness of all wicked men, whose forelock Thou holdest in
Thy hands. Thou art the first; nothing was before Thee; Thou art
the last; nothing is after Thee, etc. Pay my debt for me and let me
not sink into poverty.'" And when the khalib on Friday prays for all
Muslims, for the caliph and his army, he never forgets to add the
request w' aq# al-dayn 'an al-mudayyanin, 'Settle the debts of
those who are in debt." From this it is evident that payment of
debt was included in the efficacy of supernatural power. 'Ali is made
to say: 'The Prophet taught me some words: "If a debt oppressed
you as much as might the mountain of Thab]r, God would settle it
for you if you say these words (prayers)"."
, Al.Qaslalliini, II, p. 495.
II In my contribution to Ebers' Aegypten in Bild und Wort. I, p. 367. The
literary source of the legend is Abn'I·Fatl;1. al· 'Aw:fi, fol. 98a.
:II AI.Tirmidhi, II, p. 247, top.
" Khutab Ibn Nubata (d. 374), ed. Billa-q. 1286, p. 70, in the example for a
khutbat al·na-'t: ci. also the Friday khutba quoted in Lane, Manners and
Customs. I, p. II2, In the klmtba quoted by Sell, Faith of Islam, p, 203, this
passage docs not occur,
, AI·Tirmidlli, II, p. 274.
VENERATION OF SAINTS IN ISLAM 283
Thus the distressed man, the woman in her domestic sorrows, in
illness, poverty, etc., turn the grave of the saint; the repentant
sinner hopes to attain forgiveness through prayer at his grave.'
Women have another cause to teIl their anguish to the saint if they
are denied children. More especially in respect of warding off this
evil, popular belief has ascribed special efficacy to certain graves,
and almost every Islamic country has places of pilgrimage which
are so privileged. Damascus has its Sitti Zaytiin, Egypt its saint
Badawi at Tanta" barren women in Algeria turn to the miraculous
staff of Sidi 'Ali Talib in the Kuku mosque.' Clenier' teIls us, a
century ago: 'In the mountains not far from Fez is a saint whom
Jews and Berbers alike venerate; in general opinion a Jew was
buried bere before the introduction of Islam. The wives of Berbers
and Jews who desire children make pilgTimage on foot to the peak
of the mountain where the grave of this saint is situated. Nearby
is a bay-tree which for many centuries has put forth leaves again
from its trunk, and this easily convinces these superstitious people
that the saint has vitalizing powers.'
To some saints definite spheres of efficacy have been ascribed in
the local cult of certain districts within which they are said to have
special miraculous powers. In Islam too, patrons of special spheres of
life developed.' Hammer-Purgstall listed after EwIiya-Efendi the
Muslim patrons of corporations and guilds in the districts with which
he was dealing, and it must be assumed that the large number of
special patrons in Constantinople came into existence as an after-
effect of the Christian past of this town.' It is interesting that
amongst these there are also some eponymous heroes'. These patrons
are of only local significance. No generally admitted popular notion
or belief about such patron saints developed in Islam. But the various
districts have their own superstitions in this respect, or at least had
them in past ages. We shall quote an example of this: if one can
1 This capacity of sacred places was by the love poet Kuthayyir
(d. roS) to the praying place of his •Azza: 'Despair not of Allah forgiving your
sins if you pray at the place where she had prayed: Khizanat al·Adab, II, p.
379 (version of Ibn Durayd).
II Women ascribe such power also to bathing in a cistern near Dayr aI-Tin.
'Ali Bash[ Mubiirak, al·Khitatal.]ad'da, VIII, p. 33.
s Daumas, l40euys et coutumes de IJAIgJrie (Paris, 1853). p. 212.
" [Recherches historiques sur Ies Mauyes, et histoire de l'Empire de ."'Jaroc
(Paris, 1787), III, pp. 154-5. German transl.] Geschichte und Staatsverfassung
deY Konigreiche Marokko una Feu (Leipzig, 1788), p. 99.
5 E.g, in Damascus the sheikh al·Cherkesi, patron of the wool.combers,
Sidi aI-SarD.jI, patron of the saddlers; Kremer, Topographic von Damascu$,
vol. 2, pp. II, 15.
I Constantinopolis und Bosporus (Budapest, 1822), II, pp. 399-534.
, E.g. nos. 474-5, p. 497, the saint AM'I.Nidi>. (father of the cry) is patron of
the public criers in the Bezestan.
[310]
[311]
284 VOLUME TWO
speak of a general Muslim popular belief in a patron of the sea
this must be Khigr, who is m"kallafji'l-babr, in charge of everything
to do with the sea. But belief in him did not take fum hold with the
people. To guard against shipwreck and other mishaps at sea it was
usually believed that the efficacious means was not to invoke a
particular saint but to use an image of the Prophet's shoe as. a
symbolical preventive against the raging of the elements.' But ill
respect of some parts of the Islamic world there are accounts
of patron saints against mishaps at sea. Yaqiit reports from Tunis
of the saint Mu1;lriz,' whose grave is covered by a specially sacred
mosque, that sailors swear by the name of this saint-who is also
venerated by the Tunisians as their particular patron saint-and
supply themselves with dust from his grave for their journeys by
sea and make vows to him when in danger from heavy seas.· We
hear of another patron saint of sailors from the far east of Islam.
This is the saint Abii Is!)aq al-Kazariini whose grave is venerated in
Kiizariin near Shiraz. Ibn Battiita reports the following institution
connected with his veneration Travellers on the China seas have the
habit of making a solemn promise to Abu Is!)aq when they are
afraid of adverse winds or pirates. Everybody making such a vow
fills in a written pledge of the sum promised. On reaching the
mainland they are awaited on shore by the servants of the ziiwiya
of the saint, who board the ship and collect all pledges written
during the journey and levy the money. No ship returns from a
voyage to China or India without yielding many thousands of
dinars in votive fees. Poor people who beg for alms in the ziiwiya
are also furnished with drafts for specific sums which bear the seal
[312] of the head of the ziiwiya. These drafts are honoured against a
receipt by anyone who has made a vow to Abii Is!)aq and the
receipt is marked on the back of the draft. Thus a queen of India
once paid IO,OOO dinars to the dervishes of the ziiwiya,'<
Though in general the success of an appeal to the saints is not
associated with particular times, popular belief and the custom,
which gradually came to be accepted, have nevertheless devised for
the local cults times at which a call to a saint has the greatest
chance of success. These times may be anniversaries' (particularly
the mawlid days of the respective saints) or certain days in the week.
1 Cf. in Chap. IX of this study.
=The 'Sidi Mahres' of tourist literature, e.g. Kleist and Notzing, Tunis
und seine Umgebung (Leipzig, 1888), p. 41. [Cf. the note to al-Harawl, trans!.,
quoted in the next note, and Mantlqib d'Ab.a Isbiiq AI-Jabanyant ... et
Mantlqib al muhriz B. Halat, ed. H. R. Idris, Paris, 1953J.
8 (al.Harawi, ed. Sourdel.Thomine, p. 53. trallsl. p. I2r, whence) Yaqut, I.
p. 899. 17. More on the vows ofsailors in al-'Abdari, al-Madkhal, III, p. I07.
4. Ibn Battllta, II, p. 91.
Ii In Mecca this is called bawl, Snouck Hurgronje.. Mekka, II, pp. 52ft.
VENERATION OF SAINTS IN ISLAM
Thus Sunday' is specially recommended for prayers by the grave of
the great theologian and ascetic AbU'I-Fat!) Na,;r aI-Muqaddasl
(d. 490), which is close to the graves of Mu'awiya and Abii'l-Darda
in Damascus and much visited by pilgrims. It is said of the graves
of pious men and saints in Baghdad that the inhabitants of the city
fixed a day of the week for the visit to each of these graves' and the
same is known to be the practice for visits to graves in Cairo.• In
the Qarafa, which is so rich in graves of saints, there are seven to
which visits are said to be particularly efficacious and they are
usually visited on Saturdays before sunrise.'
It is not ouly on his mawlid day that the grave of a saint is the
goal of general pilgrimages. In public calamities the whole population
turns to him in crowds for help through his intercession. The graves
of saints are especially frequented in times of drought. The simple
dignity of the ceremony of istisqii', which, was meant to replace
pagan magic rites,' was not sufficient for the people, especially
since it often proved useless. Therefore they endeavoured to strength-
en the remedies and to attain God's help with more powerful means.
It is likely that from very early days men requested the intercession
of saints in this matter or that they mentioned the saints in their
prayers (see p. I06 above), and later Jiving saints were also made to
intervene if there was lack of rain.' To justify the visit to graves of
saints for the istisqii' and to prove its effectiveness, various evidence
from earlier days was at the same time invented. Once, when the
Medinians faced starvation because of lack of rain, 'A:isha advised
them to make an opening towards the sky on the grave of the
Prophet. Thus the sacred grave was brought into direct contact
with the angry heavens. When the advice of the clever woman was
carried out rain came immediately in plenty, the grass shot up and
cattle thrived.
7
This efficacy was transferred to the graves of the awliyii'. The
expression qabruh" y"stafiiq bihi,' 'rain is prayed for by his grave:
is common in the biographies of pious men. There are examples
of this from the most distant parts of the Islamic world. From the
fifth century it is related that when severe drought prevailed in
1 Tahdhib. p. 592.
I Ibn Battata, II, p. !IJ.
SMu1}.ammad al-'Abdari, al-A1adkhal, I, p. 223, bottom, in respect of the
women in Carro.
• 'AlI Elisha Mubarak. al·Khila! al.Jad'da, VIII, p. 40.
• Part I, p. 4of!.
t5 Yaqllt, I, p. 418, bottom.
't AI·Darimi, p. 25.
8 AI-Maqqari, I, p. 466. 3. of the grave of the theologian Yal;lya b. Ya};lya..
founder of the Malikite rite in Cordova; Ibn Khallikan, DO. 621. VIII, p. 6,
of the grave of Ibn Ftlrak (d. 406) in !;'lira.
[313]
1 Ibn Bashkuwcil, p. 578; d. above, p. 106 ult.
:>. AI-Qar/as, cd. Tornberg, p. 276,
a For a special peculiarity which the graves share with other sacred places
in popular belief, see Excursions and Annotations V.
" Cf. the ] ewish legend that the bodies of the martyrs of Bether do not
decay, Tanbuma, ed, Buber, Numeri, p. 164.
GFakhr aI·Din al·R.a.zi, MajiUlb. III, p. 141. al-DamIrl (SoV. al·dabba),
I, p. 397.
6 AI-Munawi, fo1. 2zb.
7 Al-MuwaUa', II, p. 30, al.Zurqani. ibid., p. 18, d. Ibn Qutayba, ed.
Wiistenfeld, p. SO, 14.
B Khital, II, p. 436; aj.Nabu!usi, fol. 32-6 (ct. a similar legend in Voyages du
R. Petachia, ed. Carmoly, Paris, I8S1, p. 37).
Cf. also Chenier, [Recherches historiques, III, p. 148=] Gescb. Ma"okko
u. Fetz. p. 95.
Samarqand and repeated istisqa' prayers had been of no avail, the
qarJ' of Samarqand held a public rogation and made a pilgrimage at
the head of his whole community to Khartank in order to pray at
al-Bukh2ri's grave. This pilgrimage is said to have been so successful
that the people had to stay at Khartank for seven days before being
able to set out on the return journey to Samarqand, because of the
downpour.' \'Vhen, in 7II, Morocco suffered from drought, the prince
Abu Sa'id set forth in order to hold a ceremonial al-istisqa' at
the head of the believers. This happened on a Wednesday. 'The
following Saturday he went with his whole army to the grave of
the saint Abu Ya' qub al-Ashqar (who had died shortly before, in
687) and prayed there fervently. God listened to his prayer and had
mercy upon him and his lands, and before they had returned a
steady downpour revived the dry fields."
(2)
The belief in the particular sanctity of saints' graves is connected
with a number of concepts about consecrated graves.
3
In Muslim
belief 'God forbade the soil to consume the bodies of prophets buried
in it,' I.e. to let them decay, and this belief was extended to the
bodies of martyrs! theologians and muezzins.
6
Desecration of a
saint's grave is considered a crime which will be avenged by terrible
divine punishment,
6
and exhumation-which is also disapproved of
for ordinary human beings'-is considered as such a desecration;
the Muslims have a number of legends which prove that every at-
tempt at exhuming the bodies of pious men in order to transport
them to other places of rest has been prevented by miraculous
accidents.' We have already in connection with the pre-Islamic
cult of the dead encountered (Part I, pp. 2l5-l7) the belief that
saints' graves were to be regarded as inviolable sanctuaries, a view
which was generally accepted, particularly in the Maghrib.'
[314]
286 VOLUME TWO
VENERATION OF SAINTS IN ISLAM 2
8
7
The belief in the sanctity of these graves reaches its peak in the
idea of the merit of pilgrimages to them (ziyara), or even that the
ziyara to the graves of saints could replace the l;ajj. The possibility
of supposing this is seen (for the fourth century) in a dirge by AbU'l-
'Ala' (on the occasion of the death of two 'Alids): 'Two takb,r in
fr?nt of your grave are considered equal to the 'umra (small pil-
gnmage) and thetawafaround the Ka'ba.'l This belief does not hold
for all graves of saints. Popular veneration has accorded this
privilege only to some of them; for this matter too it was merely the
popular suffrage, not that of the authoritative theologians, which was
able to effect in the various lands of Islam the circumvention of that
canonic law of the l;ajj. On a high peak of the Atlas mountains
(Guraya) used to be the grave of the Marabut Sidi Bosgri; the French
later made this into a fort in l883. A visit to this sacred place was a
substitute for the pilgrimage to Mecca in the case of poor and
weak people" In Kalburga (India) is the grave of Benda Nuwaz'
this saint declared during his lifetime that a visit to his
was a substitute for the pilgrimage to Mecca in cases where the
performance of the !;ajj presented great difficnlties.3
. At other sacr:d places to such privileges were not explicitly
gIven, the tawaf (sevenfold crrcumambulation) is carried out as at
the Ka'ba and the pilgrimage to them is called l;ajj' like the Mecca
pilgrimage, whereas normally visits to the graves of saints are
merely called ziyara. This is expressly stated of a mosque in al-
Janad (southern Arabia) whose foundation tradition ascribes to
!'fu'adh b. Jabal. People make pilgrimages the (yal;ujjun ilayhi)
III the same way as they do the sacred house, and people say to one
another: 'Wait until the l;ajj is completed,' meaning the pilgrimage
to the mosque at al-Janad.· A sevenfold tawafis recommended also
for the old mosque at Fustat and is praised as highly efficacious. Al-
Maqrizi describes the stations of this circumambulation in detail
but it seems that it has not been practised for a long time.•
hardt observed the sevenfold tawafby the grave of 'Abd al-Ra!}miin
at Kenne Egypt) which every pilgrim carried
out llI1IIlediately after his arnval.' In this connection must also be
mentioned the tawaf around the in Jerusalem which is
1 Sag! a&·Zand, II. p. 61, V. 3.
a Baude, L'Algme (Paris, 1841), I, p. II9.
• Herklots, Qanan aI-Islam. p. 175.
4. J;i'asan's words in al-Tabari,. II, p. 143, 19, belong here? An 'Alid
tradItion makes I;rasan say after the cruel execution of the 'Alids by Ziyad:
l:lujjultum (do pilgrimage to their graves).
6 Yaql1t, II, p. 127. s.v.
, Khi/at, II, p. 255-
7 Travels in Arabia, I, p. 173; cf. regarding this saint (d. 592), 'Ali Mubarak,
XIV,p.133·
Be
[315]
1 Quarterly Statement, 1879. p. 2I.
• AZ·M.dkhal, II, p. 9'; III, p. 265 (I.waf).
I: Majalis al.Abriir (MX. Vien. Cat., Mixt. no. 154). foI. 74.
4. Qutb aI.Din, ekron. Mekka. p. 2I.
r; Cf. Reinaud, Mont'mens . .. du Cabinet tie .111'. Ie Due de Blacas, II, p. 221,
note 2.
stiU practised by pious pilgrims. At this tawiij, however, pilgrims
scrupulously avoid making it identical with the procession
round the Ka'ba and take it in a different direction from that
usual at Mecca.' Theologians opposed to bid' a felt cal1ed upon
to declaim against the pilgrimage ceremonies practised at the
sakhra.
2
. From these examples it is evident that there is an endeavour to
attribute the privileges of the sanctuary at Mecca to other sacred
places also. This probably sprang partly from practical needs,
because of fulfilment of the sacred obligation of the bajj is not pos-
sible for al1 Muslims and it was desired to provide the poorer sections
of the population in outlying parts of the Muslim world with some
substitute for this important religious function. It is unlikely that
even orthodox theologians were greatly opposed to this, since the
more responsible of them had at all times condemned the carefree
trust in God which caused poor people to undertake the pilgrimage
without sufficient means and thus to become beggars. Altogether,
from the very first the pilgrimage was obligatory only to those
manistatii' a ilayhi sabUan (SUra 39:I). In fact there arose in Islam
a state which was described by a mischievous person as foUows:
The rich pilgrimage for pleasure, the middle classes for trade, the
readers of the Koran from hypocrisy (to be heard and seen), the poor
in order to beg, and thieves in order to steal."
Every now and then there are attempts to diminish the great
importance which the bajj has in the general consciousness and more
especially to depreciate the value of the sanctimoniousness which
manifests itself in it. The following saying is transmitted from a
pious man of the older period of Islam (al-sala!): 'that many a man
in Khorasan is nearer to this house than those who actual1y ac-
complish its circumambulation,"" and this same view is echoed in
many sayings by Muslim moralists. _ The mystic al-I:Ial1aj carried
this view to its furthest conclusions. He taught: 'If someone is
unable to accomplish the pilgrimage to Mecca in person he is to
choose a clean part of his house and to keep it from al1 profanations
in order there to observe at the time of the pilgrimages the same
rites which are practised in Mecca. Thereafter he is to collect thirty
orphans and to give them a splendid meal in this room and to
provide them with clothes and seven dirhams each. This is counted
for him as a proper bajj'. Al-I:Ial1aj claimed to have obtained this
[316]
288 VOLUME TWO VENERATION OF SAINTS IN ISLAM 289
teaching from work of the pious al-I:Iasan All these are
endeavours, undertaken from different points of view, on the one
one hand to counteract sanctimoniousness and hypocrisy connected
with the Meccan pilgrimage, on the other to provide a counter-
weight to the difficulties caused to the poor if the pilgrimage is
considered as an irremissible obligation. The people's veneration
for some honoured graves of saints helped these theological en-
deavours.
The Muslims of North Africa, whose national saint up to the
borders of the Sahara is S,dl 'Abd aI-Qadir, tell the foUowing story
of one of his miracles. There was once a poor, old, childless woman
cal1ed Tuaja whose dearest wish it was to make the pilgrimage to
Mecca prescribed by religious law before she died. Her poverty did
not permit her to achieve this her dearest wish, since she was so
poor that she could not even afford a rosary. In order to obtain this
piece of religious eqnipment, which no pious Muslim Can do without,
she collected date-stones in which she made holes and then strung
them together like a rosary. With this makeshift rosary in her
hand she spent her days in a place dedicated to the memory of the
holy marabut 'Abd al-Qadir,' praying fervently that God might
not take her poverty for sin and would count the days spent at this
sacred place in lieu of the pilgrimage. When this pious woman died,
her rosary, as her only worldly possession, was put into the grave
with her. The Prophet himself visited the grave and the tears that
he shed at her grave fertilized the dry date-stones of the rosary
so that they grew into palm-trees bearing the sweetest species of
this fruit, known as the aeget (=aeqlat) nilr dates, the finest of the
fifteen types of dates in North Africa.' This is reminiscent of analo-
gouslegends of antiquity and Christianitywhich talk of the fertilizing
powers of tears or blood of mythical persons and saints." Muslim
legend also tells us that the rose came into being from drops of
Muhammed's sweat.- Nee rosarum folia kumi jaeer. patiuntur
1 Abulfcda, Annales, II, p. 341. [See L. Massignon, La Passion d'al-Hallaj,
PP.27Sff. For the substitution of visits to saints or of charity for the pilgrimage
d. also F. Meier in Asiatische Studien, XI (1957-8), pp. I4S:ff.]
S Not his grave (the saint is not buried in Norh Africa where he is chiefly
venerated), but a place where he lived and taught in Algiers, Trumelet, Les
Saints du Tell, pp. 297. 304. Seven sanctuaries are dedicated to this saint in
the environs of Algiers.
3 H. B. Tristram, The Great Sahara: Wanderings South ajthe Atlas Mountains
(London, '860), p. 97.
, According to the Egyptian novel of the two brothers (Papyrus d'Orbiney)
the blood of Batan, who had beenturnedinto an Apis bull, blossomed into a tree.
Ii Cited as ltadUk mawq,u' in al-Damirl (s.v. aI-ward), II, p. 463. In the
MantkuriiJ al.Nawawf, fol. 32b, the question is raised (and, of course, answered
in tbe negative) whether this belief was founded on truth, and the sweat of
is also mentioned, d. I, p. 363.
[317]
[318]
[3191
VOLUME TWO
(Turcae)-says Busbeck-iJuod ut veteres rosam ex sanguine Veneris
sic isti ex sudore Mahumetis natam sibi persuaserint.1 I
Much as the journeys of lalab in the field of scholarship, pilgrimages
on the religious plane developed iuto a form of sport among pious
circles. Many pious people-but also vagrants-add to the journey
to Mecca visits to the holy graves in many countries: ziyarat.
Wherever they hear of a saint's grave they direct their steps to it.
The journey of 'Abd al-Ghani al-Nabulusi had no other purpose
than.to visit all the of saints in Syria, Palestine and Egypt.
Muslims of conservative VIews and free from popular superstitions
approve such pious journeys. Visits to these graves serve, according
to them, at least li'l-tabarruk, by which they also mean 'inner reli-
gious strengthening.' Even where I live, pilgrims from Muslim
are occasionally seen whose tour of ziyara of many years'
duration leads them to the qubba of the Turkish saint Gill Baba,
who is buried upon the 'Hill of Roses.' The pious pilgrims usually
combine their journeys with the secular purpose of conducting a poor
retail trade with the products of their country, thus defraying the
ccst of their travels. They used to say: hem ziyiirel hem tijiiret,
'partly pilgrimage, partly trade.' A large literature of ziyiira deve-
loped from such aims, books in which the places where saints'
graves are situated are enumerated and described from the author's
own experience for the use of those who wish to undertake a ziyiira
journey.·
VI
The primary function of the veneration of saints in Islam is to
satisfy the instinct to look up to perfections within the human
sphere which are worthy of veneration and admiration, and the
1 ed. Elzevir (Leiden, 1633), p. 5r.
I Some of such guides for pilgrims are mentioned in ZDPV, II, p. 14. AI.
Harawi's work (cf. Bodl. Cat., Ms. no. XLV) has since been studied by Ch.
Scheier in the Archives de l'orient latin, I, pp. 587-609 [al-lshiiriit ilii Ma'rifat
al·Ziyiirat, ed. J. Sourdel-Thomine, Damascus, 1953, French transl. by same,
Damascus, 1957]. A number of books on ziyariit are also listed in al-
Maqrizi, Khila!, II, p. 463. A K. al·Mazarat by aI·Sakhawi (d. 902) is printed
in vol. IV of the new Egyptian edition of al·Maqqari (Cairo, 1304). A guide for
the visit of the graves of saints on the Muqattam is the anonymous Murshicl
al·Zuwwar [it is in fact by Muwaffaq aI-Din b. 'Uthman] (up till the middle of
the eighth century), Cat. ar. By. Mus., p. 687a, no. 1506; Kremer, Samml.
orient. Hschr., p. 3I, no. 49. To this literature belong also the treatises con·
tained in the Arabic Mss. D.C. nos. q6 [al.Zayyat's al·Kawakib al-Sayyiira]
and 317 of the Leipzig Univ. Library. A specially Shi'ite guide is the K. alA
Ziyiirat by Mu1J.ammad b. Al}.mad b. DawO.d al-Qummr, extracts of which are
to be found in the KashkiU, p. I07. [Further details about these books, and the
literature of the 'guides' in general, in the introduction to the French transl.
of al.Harawi, pp. xxxff.]
VENERATlON OF SAINTS IN ISLAM 29
I
possessors of which are not only exercising the highest virtue and
sanctity but have also the power to do-on behalf of those who
trust in them-things which appear impossible, things which we call
'miraculous', or as the Muslims put it, 'which break the habitual
course.'
But the satisfaction of this need became, in Islam as well as in
other religions, the frame for a religious development which differen-
tiated the direction and content of this veneration in the vast area
of Islam. Close study of the types of saint veneration and the trend
of legends of saints in various parts of the Muslim world will reveal
that, also in Islam, the cult of saints shows-in accordance with the
old traditions of the nations whose religions were swamped by Islam
-an unmistakable individual character which to this day the
universalistic and levelling character of Islamic religion has been
unable to stamp out. When considering legends of saints from
various ethnographical layers, it would seem as if those legends and
ideas which grew on Arab soil contain less wild imagination and
exaggeration than those of the local saints of other races, that in
fact they developed in another direction and that they are attached
to a group of ideas other than the legends of the latter.
From all that we have previously sald about the mentality and
traditions of true Arabs, we shall understand that the cult of saints,
in so far as under the influence of Islamit transformed theideals of the
Bedouins, was linked with the cult of muruwwa, which through the
influence of the din took the form of religious veneration. TheBedouins
too have their heroes whomtheyhonour after deathwith a veneration
which from the point of view of Islam must come into the category of
the cult ofthe walis.' But the traditions of these graves clearly show
the character of Bedouin ideas. A few examples will show what are
the concepts about these truly Arabian waifs. To this day· the grave
of the sheikh Zuwayd is extant near Za'qa by the Syro-Egyptian
border not far from al-'Arish. This grave is revered by the local
Bedouins as much as ever before. 'Abd al-Ghani al-Nabulusi gave an
interesting description of this plate: 'The gate to the funerary chapel
is never closed and it is believed that any goods deposited there
will never be stolen
3
and that everybody finds safe protection and
1 For the walt:·cult of the Bedouins see Snouck Hurgronie, Mekka. I, p. 38,
and the passages from Burckhardt's travels cited there.
J Cf. Schumacher, 'Researches in Southern Palestine,' Quarterly Statement.
x886, pp. I8Sff., where there is a detailed description of this grave and the
district: •AIr Muba.rak, X. p. 93.
aThe religiously influenced Bedouins of the Sinai peninsula also transformed
the tradition of the Arba'in monastery in Wadi: Leja (devoted to the forty
Cappadocian martyrs) into a legend whereby any theft committed there would
immediately be discovered; see Palmer: The Desert of the Exodus, [1, p. I19.
German transl. Der Schauplatz etc.•] p. 93.
[3201
292 VOLUME TWO
complete sanctuary from persecutors at the grave of the saint:
This legend about the Bedouin saint is essentially different from the
miraculous legends about the graves of the real saints of Islam.
The saints of the Bedouins show no pietistic element. The legend
praises such virtues of the deceased chief as constitute the religion
of the desert dwellers, the muruwwa, which, just as it fills the whole
soul of the son of the desert, does not cease to be effective at the grave
of the dead tribal sheikh. He practises in aiterlife only what he had
done before death in his own tent and to practise which is the
religion of the Bedouins: faithfulness towards the jar who enters his
tent asking for asylum, even if it costs him his own life. The gates of
his mausoleum are hospitably open in the same way as the entrance
to a Bedouin tent is open to everybody.
Further north, in that part of the I:Iawran which is called al-
Rul>ba, another Bedouin wali represents the same idea. This is
sheikh Seraq, who amongst the robber tribes of the Syrian desert
is the invisible support of law and order and who according to
popular belief kills men and animals on the spot if they dare to
damage the crops of strangers. Wetzstein' relates: 'In the middle of
[321] the sown fields is the grave of the local saint sheikh Seraq surrounded
by little flags. He is the invisible administrator of law and order
amongst these robbers. He is very greatly feared ... If an inhabitant
leaves the country for any length of time he takes valuables, weapons,
carpets, clothes and even cash to sheikh Seraq and is certain to
find them untouched on his return. Towards the end of Mayor
beginning of June, the Rul)ba and its surroundings are deserted by
the inhabitants because of great heat and lack of water and green
pasture; they move with their cattle to the eastern slopes of the
I:Iawran mountains. During that time they leave in all confidence
their winter stores of corn in the caves near the white castle, knowing
full well nobody would dare to steal things entrusted to sheikh
Seriiq'. The same is reported of other holy graves of the Bedouins
in Transjordan. Amongst them a wali in the Wadi Yabis is promin-
ent, in whose vicinity granaries are preferably kept, since the
Bedouins believe that the saint protects the corn from thieves.
They maintain: 'Nobody is able to steal any goods kept there: i.e.
nobody dares to do so for fear of the saint. On account of this
belief the corn is as safe in this place as if it were kept locked up.'
The Bedouin saint is no shaft" no intercessor for the sinners
among those venerating him; neither does he work miracles, nor is
1 Reisebericht uber I:Iauran una die Trachonen. p. 3I.
~ Selah Merill, East of the Jordan (London, 1881), pp. 180 and 497. cf. the
account of Schumacher, Across the Jordan (London, 1885), p. 5 which tallies
with this. The Jews had a similar belief about the grave of the prophet Ezekiel,
Voyages du R. PetachJ'a, ed. Carmoly, p. 40.
.1
VENERATION OF SAINTS IN ISLAM 293
he in close contact with Allah like his proper Muslim counterpart.
Rather is he the protect